FOOD + DRINK + DINING

5 restaurant trends we love

The “Georgette” utensil

The “Georgette” utensil (a spoon/fork hybrid) at Alain Ducasse’s Spoon, InterContinental Hong Kong

Non-smoking policies (and creative evasions thereof, like the “smoking limo” parked outside David Burke & Donatella, New York)

Bespoke menu items, like one fishery’s entire Skeena salmon catch bought by C Restaurant, Vancouver

Wine “doggie bags” in France and New York State

Niche menus for honey, water, salt, even knives

5 bright food-packaging ideas

A sticker that changes colour when fruit ripens, from New Zealand

Olive oil packaged box-wine style

Chocolate claiming mood-enhancing properties from New Tree

Vitamin water

Designer sugar packages

5 foods that are going upscale

Mozzarella at Obika cheese bar in Rome

Street food: barbecue (Smoke, Ing., San Francisco; Daisy May’s BBQ USA, New York) and burger stands (Shake Shack kiosk in Madison Square Park, New York)

Ice cream: Cold Stone Creamery custom-blending parlours in the U.S.; lounge-like heladerías in Madrid; and “vice cream,” like Illicit Vodka Cranberry Magnum from Australia

Cereal at Cereality Cereal Bar & Café, Tempe, Ariz.

Dim sum and tea at Yauatcha, London

The low-carb potato

5 foods we’ll be eating in 2005

The low-carb potato, developed in the Netherlands

Argan oil

Grass-fed beef, like Charolais from southern Burgundy in France

Bison and moose cheese

Everything grilled

5 drink ideas we love

Food-cocktail pairings

Biodynamic wine from France and California

Navan vanilla-flavoured cognac

Pomegranate juice as a cocktail mixer

Manuka Honey Vodka by New Zealand’s 42 Below

Sofia

5 ways to reverse wine snobbery

Low-fixed-markup wine lists at restaurants

More mini-sparkling wines, like Baby Piper bottles and Sofia cans from Francis Ford Coppola’s vineyard

Quality budget brands, like Little Penguin from the makers of Lindemans

Barrel-blending programs (in the U.S.), where amateurs can mix their own vintages

Wine shops that focus on great bottles for under $20