Home Cooking Trends of 2020

Let's start by exploring what we are seeing happening now in Allrecipes kitchens. We know more people are cooking than ever: Nearly three-quarters of Allrecipes cooks say they're using more new recipes versus two years ago. More than half of these Allrecipes cooks are preparing new recipes weekly.

Across all ages of home cooks, the criteria for a good recipe remains the same: taste, convenience, and ease are most important. (We hear you!) But we've seen a rise in the importance of healthfulness and familiarity with ingredients to Allrecipes cooks.

In this research, we found seven key areas of insights. Here, we explore where we are today, with the ingredients and foods you likely have in your fridge as you read this. And then we look at where we're headed, with an eye toward things we expect you'll be reaching for sooner rather than later.

Ready? Let's get started.

Cooks today are arguably the most informed generation yet when it comes to access to unlimited resources across magazines, the Internet, TV, and smart devices that are rich with recipes, ingredient information, and cooking instructions. The increased curiosity and connectedness around food is driving a strong appetite for adventure and cultural heritage when it comes to our food choices.

Related: Getting in Touch Through Kamayan, the Ultimate Filipino Feast

Indeed, we see in our growth of cultural recipes from around the world that cooks want to travel with their taste buds. They're excited to prepare traditional dishes from many global cuisines. This trend is being driven by a variety of factors including: the increasingly cultural diversity, young parents prioritizing passing along cultural heritage to their families, and growing excitement among cooks to see the world through foods.

Food from the Philippines — which blends Asian, Latin, American, and island culinary influences for a delicious flavor all its own — is trending, in restaurants and home kitchens. Indeed, our research showed that Filipino cuisine has seen a significant popularity growth in the last year, with Filipino recipe views growing by a whopping 32 percent year over year. Why? Perhaps it's because most of the dishes are gluten-free. Favorites like Chicken Adobo and Caldereta (a Filipino beef recipe) fit into that category. It may be because many of the dishes are prepared ahead of time, so they lend themselves to popular meal-prep cooking.

Related: The 10 Best Filipino Chicken Recipes

It might also be because families across the U.S. are finding themselves drawn to cultural or ancestral elements of the island nation. The Filipino Kamayan, a communal feast laid out on banana leaves, encourages eating with your hands, connecting to your dishes, and experiencing flavors and foods in close proximity.

Keep Reading: Here's the Filipino Trick for Measuring Water for Rice

You don't have to tell anyone who loves Indian curry or any of our most popular Indian recipes why we predict Indian food will be the next trend in global cuisines for the home cook. Indian foods align well with vegan, vegetarian, and flexitarian diets. Many are gluten-free, and they also lend themselves beautifully to preparation in a slow cooker or Instant Pot.

Related: How to Stock Your Spice Cabinet for Indian Cooking

Many traditional Indian dishes also employ ingredients, like turmeric, that are trending and healthful. Lentils, chickpeas, spinach, and kale are also on on the frequently-used ingredient list.

Keep Reading: Spicy Secrets for Making Better Indian Food at Home

As cooks become comfortable with preparing new cuisines, they are encountering and embracing new ingredients. This shifting behavior is driving increased shopping of grocery channels, such as ethnic grocers and online grocers, as cooks seek to find ingredients that may not be in their pantry or conventional supermarket.

In fact, more than one-third of Allrecipes cooks say an "interest in experimenting with new foods" is extremely important to them when choosing a new recipe. And nearly a majority of Allrecipes cooks say they are always looking to add new flavors to their foods and like to try foods they haven't eaten before.

These cooks shared with us their favorite ingredients, and then we're sharing the things we see heading for home cooks's kitchens very soon.

Pork belly, a boneless piece of meat which comes from the pig's midsection, has long been considered a delicacy in Asian cooking, but today, it's been embraced by home cooks of all stripes. Over the last year, Allrecipes has seen more than 100 percent growth year over year in searches for pork belly recipes, as new ingredients inspired by global cuisines are finding a new life in home kitchens.

Related: How to Cook Pork Belly Like a Pro

Chef John's Crispy Pork Belly is a wonderful introductory recipe if you've never cooked with pork belly yourself, but you'll find it in Asian favorites like Dong Po (Chinese Pork Belly) and Thit Ko (Caramelized Pork Belly).

If you thought the search for recipes with pork belly was impressive, you'll be blown away by the increased search for recipes with Mexican chorizo. In the last year, we've seen a nearly 300 percent growth in search for recipes that use the spicy ground meat sausage.

Related: What Is Chorizo?

New global flavors are extending beyond traditional boundaries. Chipotle, for example, has been a hot flavor for several years. It's influence is felt most heavily in Mexican cuisine, but really, there's no where chipotle won't go — burgers, meatloaf, hummus.

Related: 30 Ways to Cook with Canned Chipotles in Adobo Sauce

But coming to your kitchen soon will be harissa, a spicy pepper sauce traditionally served North African and Moroccan recipes. Harissa, similar to chipotle, offers an easy way to add heat and flavor to any number of dishes.

Related: The Best Recipes with Spicy Harissa Sauce

It's likewise very versatile, easily going in sauces, on eggs, in soups and stews, or swirled into dips. Bonus: It's gluten-free, which makes it a no-brainer for cooks who prepare food for a variety of dietary needs.

New flavors and ingredients in the home cook's kitchen and pantry are driving twists on classic American dishes. Korean Fried Chicken, which moved from food trucks to brick-and-mortar restaurants to home kitchens, has seen year over year growth with Allrecipes cooks.

Related: The Best Korean Chicken Recipes

Pollo Campero, or "country chicken," is fueling excitement for the emergence of Peruvian chicken in home kitchens. This world's-largest Latin chicken chain boasts a dedicated following, and it gains new ones daily.

Related: This Peruvian Chicken Is the Best Roast Chicken You'll Ever Eat

Peruvian chicken is made using a wet spice rub that imparts a strong spiced flavor, but it's also has very little to no sugar, which makes it ideal for low-carb and low-sugar eaters.

At gatherings today, food is moving beyond the buffets, kitchen counters, and dining rooms to instead become a defining part of the party's conversation  and ambiance. Food and cooking where the guests get involved is a growing entertaining format.

Factors driving the trend include: Lessens the load for the host, food becomes a growing part of the conversation and entertainment, guests more easily tailor the dish to match their flavor and dietary preferences, and more home owners installing elaborate outdoor cooking areas that allow guests to cook.

Related: 5 Dinner Party Ideas That Make Dinner the Show

Entertaining is becoming less formal, less structured, and less planned. Home cooks are excited to bring family and friends together for all types of holidays and smallidays. But as with weeknight meals, Allrecipes cooks prefer entertaining be easy instead of elaborate. They want to spend more time with their guests instead of cooking, serving, and preparing food.

Related: Our Most Popular Potluck Recipes

As such, most hosts are finding ways where guests are allowed — and even encouraged — to contribute to the food at the gathering. Potluck-style gatherings make entertaining less work, more fun, and more affordable. It also afford cooks a chance to try new recipes. In fact, three-quarters of Allrecipes cooks say when they host or attend a potluck, they bring a new recipe to the table.

Pellet smokers, such as the Traeger Grill, are easy to control even for novice cooks, and many are now equipped with Wi-Fi, allowing easier and better control and monitoring. Allrecipes cooks searched for smoker recipes more frequently in the last 12 months. Recipes like Smoked Chicken Hot Wings and smoked turkey are driving the trend, but smoked pork roasts and smoked salmon are the top protein choices for most cooks on Allrecipes. 

Allrecipes cooks have been searching for recipes cooked on a griddle more in the last year. And it's no wonder — outdoor griddles, often part of elaborate outdoor kitchens, are a great way to cook nearly any meal of the day and for a crowd. From bacon, eggs, and pancakes at breakfast to griddle cheesesteaks, burgers, and brats at lunch and dinner, the broad cooking space allows cooks to prepare a variety of foods for their friends and family.

Related: The Best Electric Griddles to Buy in 2020

More people are hosting outdoor parties across three or even four of the seasons. Hot beverages, something to keep everyone lingering outside a bit longer when the temps might be a bit chilly, are up in search among Allrecipes cooks.

Hot chocolate, a family-friendly hot beverage, is an always popular option. In the last year, searches for homemade hot chocolate recipes have been on the rise. Peak month for hot cocoa making is December, but we're even seeing folks searching in May.

Related: How to Set Up a Hot Chocolate Bar

Champurrado and Atole, both authentic Mexican beverages, are quickly rising in popularity among Allrecipes cooks. These beverages, inspired by the broader interest in global cuisine, are easily customized.

Champurrado is served more commonly, as Atole is considered a Christmas beverage. But champurrado can feature a variety of flavors, like peanut butter, orange zest, chocolate, and more.

Related: What is Piloncillo? How Is It Used?

If you find yourself having snacks for supper, hosting drink-and-nibble gatherings rather than dinner parties, or turning fridge scraps into cheese boards on the regular, you're part of the grazing trend.

It's built on our love of snacking and variety, a move toward more casual and inclusive dining and the busy pace of modern life. Grazing gives us permission to keep moving, to choose our own dinner destines, and to enjoy a little bit of lots of different things.

Related: How to Make the Ultimate Crowd-Pleasing Snack Boards

Finger foods are among the fastest growing recipe categories for Allrecipes cooks. This type of dinner option allows for more informal eating — while watching TV, standing in the kitchen, driving in the car. 

Views for finger food recipes aligned with dinner were up over 600 percent year over year. But finger foods aligned with breakfast — think mini quiches, ham and cheese sandwiches, and donut-inspired muffins — were up over 700 percent in searches in the last year.

Spring rolls, lumpia, egg rolls — they've found their way from restaurant appetizer menus to home kitchens thanks in large part to familiarity with the ingredients and methods used to cook these classic finger foods.

Related: Your Guide to Asian Wrappers: When and How to Use Each Variety

Arepas, a popular type of South American street food, is regularly made in homes, particularly in Colombia and Venezuela. But now, Allrecipes cooks are welcoming the stuffed cornmeal cakes into their kitchens as part of the trend of finger foods that are ideal for dinner.

Similarly, empanadas are becoming more and more popular. The baked or fried hand pies, which are often filled with beans, chicken, cheese, and other bits of veggies, have seen an increase in searches among Allrecipes cooks. 

Related: Our Best Empanada Recipes

Refrigerated pizza dough makes for a quick crust for any number of dishes. The convenient short-cut ingredient is especially handy for appetizers, from Pizza Dough Pretzels to calzone-style pizza rings. The time-consuming steps of making, rising, and waiting for homemade dough are done for you, which is why it's been such a popular ingredient for so many Allrecipes cooks in recent years.

Related: 10 Quick and Easy Snacks to Make With Refrigerated Pizza Dough

Puff pastry is an elegant but almost entirely too easy ingredient that's perfect for putting finishing crusts on dinners or turning humble snacks and appetizers into show-stopping nibbles. 

Related: Browse our collection of Frozen Puff Pastry Appetizers.

Allrecipes cooks are drawn to the elevated appeal of puff pastry for appetizers — and the fact is still has a high level of convenience. You can also get very creative with puff pastry and make fun shapes. Our Nutella Pastry Christmas Tree is alway popular around the holidays.

Food and health always meet at a crossroads, and perhaps now more than ever before. Cooks are increasingly making dietary choices to manage or boost their health for conditions such as heart health, diabetes, brain functions, cancer prevention, digestive function, and more. 

Nearly 6 in 10 Allrecipes cooks say they are cooking more often from "healthy" recipes versus two years ago. And almost half of Allrecipes cooks say they're working hard to make small, permanent changes in their eating for a healthier lifestyle.

Allrecipes cooks report they are placing a keen eye on nutrient-dense foods that deliver benefits above their weight class. This includes ingredients that contain fiber, antioxidants, anti-inflammatory properties, and high amounts of vitamins.

In fact, more than half of Allrecipes cooks say they're paying closer attention to specific foods and ingredients, and they're also actively seeking to avoid "bad" foods. These new, healthful ingredients also bring Allrecipes cooks to make new recipes.

In short, Allrecipes cooks are being very deliberate in their food choices as they look to specific ingredients and nutritional criteria to help them manage or prevent chronic disease.

Turmeric is valued for its anti-inflammatory properties, and it's most commonly showing up in searches on Allrecipes for turmeric milk, tikka masala, and chicken biryani.

Related: Winter Blues? Try a Little Turmeric

Tamarind is key ingredient in southeast Asian and South American cuisines. This fruit produces a brown, edible paste that has a sweet-sour but rich flavor. It's used a lot in desserts, but it's also in iconic dishes like Pad Thai, Tamarind Chicken, and Tamarind Fish Curry.

The health benefits of tamarind have been well-studied, and they include its ability to reduce inflammation throughout the body, improve vision, boost respiratory health, heal skin conditions, and improve the digestive system.

Related: 15 Recipes That Use Tamarind