Open This When You're Ready for the New Year 🎇
Welcome to Secret Breakfast / The best place to start the ending of the year, or ending what you started too late, dreaming about yaupon tea, minibar shots and grandmacore
Hi there!
I could bore you with a navel-gazing essay about the year just passed.
But I care about you too much for that.
Instead, I wish you a pantry never empty of the only nourishment that doesn't make us fat: love.
We'll reconnect in 2026, with fresh appetites, hunting for new flavor in our days.
Cheers!
Piero
✹Woodkid, To The Wilder (lyrics video), awesome, awesome tune from Death Stranding 2: On the Beach soundtrack. I don't play videogames, but 2025 was my Hideo Kojima year.
We'll have a "fricy" 2026
It's the time of food predictions. All publications agree on one central point: 2026 will mark a return to simplicity and authenticity, in contrast to the viral and theatrical excesses of 2025.
A collective desire emerges for comfort, substantial quality, and genuine connection with food.
The predictions reflect economic tensions (inflation, high prices) and social anxieties (instability, digital overload), with consumers seeking real value, manageable portions, and functional ingredients. Curiously, humble ingredients like cabbage and brown butter become protagonists, while regional culinary traditions and nostalgia replace innovation for innovation's sake.
The New York Times (link)
- Foodmaxing meets "grandmacore" (traditional fermented foods, sourdough bread)
- Texture as new choice driver (crunchy, chewy, creamy)
- Vinegar as ingredient of the year
- Local American ingredients (yaupon tea, pawpaw, bison)
- Kitchen couture (packaging as decorative element)
- Heightened sensory attention and inclusivity for neurodivergent diners
- Focus on "value" rather than affordability
- Smaller restaurants with personalized service
- Cabbage as vegetable of the year
BBC Food (link)
- "Fricy" flavors (fruity + spicy: chamoy, yuzu kosho)
- Mini portions and "snackification" (Ozempic/GLP-1 influence)
- Functional food and drinks (fiber, probiotics, mushroom coffee)
- Brown butter as viral technique
- Jacket potato reinvented (Kim Kardashian effect)
- Cabbage comeback (dumplings, golumpki, fermented)
Delish (link)
- Simplicity as dominant trend (less complexity, more quality)
- Nostalgia and comfort food (well-executed classics, Beef Wellington)
- Immersive experiences and interactive dining
- Heritage cooking (regional cuisines, Filipino, African)
- Health-conscious cooking (real proteins, no powders)
- No/low-ABV cocktails
Bonus, by Food & Wine: The Food Trends We Nailed — and the Ones We Definitely Didn’t
🥔I just cooked the last dish of 2025: Michelin Star Potato Dauphinoise (★recipe), stay for the final trick 🏅Slate's 10 Best Recipes of 2025 from the year’s cookbooks 🥈F&W's 20 Most Popular Recipes of 2025 😴Minibar Shots, but for sleep (★recipe) 🤧Home-made Cough Drops (★recipe) 🤒Anti-cold Clear Gummies (★recipe) 🍔Black Bean Patty Melt (★recipe) 🍴Forks Out: A Benoit Blanc Sesame Street Mystery
One Gazan Girl’s Fight to Survive Extreme Hunger
Ben Hubbard and Bilal Shbair / The New York Times
After Israel sealed Gaza’s borders, Hoda Abu al-Naja, 12, who suffered from celiac disease, spent months seeking the food and care she needed to combat malnutrition.
I opened a bookshop. It was the best, worst thing I’ve ever done
Chloe Fox / FT
This piece captures opening a bookshop—the terror of risking everything, then finding a stranger's letter that reminds you why it matters beyond profit. It's beautiful because vulnerability meets purpose: fear dissolves when you realize you're serving someone who needs stories to survive. For hospitality, the same truth applies—you're not selling products, you're creating spaces where people trust you with their loneliness and need for connection.
