We were lucky enough to attend a very interesting event called Food Loves Tech. It is a “first-of-its-kind education by entertainment innovation expo, focusing on how technology shapes and changes the way we cultivate and consume food.” Yes, it is all about food of the future! It is not all about technology-related products, but also introducing “new and alternative ingredients, best practices, sustainability, composting, and shifts back toward more simplistic approaches.” The ticket was $75/person (plus fees), and guess what? It is all-you-can-eat-and-drink after that!

This happens to be their third year, but I never heard about them until now… They used an old industrial building in Brooklyn, which is also becoming a really wonderful destination spot with loads of shops and eateries, calling themselves the “Industrial City.” One of the new feature under construction in the Industrial City is Japan Village. What! I can’t wait for them to open that! Ok, back to this event. It was nicely laid out, easy to walk around and visit each booth. We got there early, so it was not too crowded, not much of any lines to get to food or drinks.

The first booth we visited was Manna Fish Farms. They are about the future of sustainable seafood production. They grow local and wild finfish, organic and sustainable way. At this event, they were offering Seared Organic Rainbow Trout with FurikakeSseasoning, Organic Micro Green Salad with Yuzu Vinaigrette. It was quite nice, tender and juicy, flavorful and tasty. Not fishy at all. With the greens and yuzu, it tasted very clean.

Right near the first booth we visited was Blue Point Brewing Company. It was still the morning hours, but hey, it is the weekend, so why not? We got some samples of their beer offering, and yes, they were all tasty. So why were they here at this event? Good question. They have a brand new beer called Good Reef Ale, and with every Good Reef Ale sold, five oyster will be restored to Billion Oyster Project’s Community Oyster Reef in NYC. Pretty cool!

They also had something really interesting. They had a beer can with cool design that says “Voters’ Day Off” – the beer was IPA and was really nice, but this beer came with more than just good taste. It had a real purpose! After trying a sample of the beer, they gave us an empty can. On the back, you can sign your name and put it in the mail box. It is their campaign to turn Election Day into a national holiday. I’m all for getting another day off from work! LOL.

We saw several organizations that are currently doing some indoor vertical farming of organic micro greens and herbs without sunlight nor soil, but with LED lights and technology. Pretty cool!

But the most interesting one we found when it comes to growing greens with technology was Farm.One. They are technology-powered urban vertical farm. They grow over 500 kind of rare herbs, microgreens, and edible flowers. You might have already eaten some of their products at restaurants in NYC. Here, you get to actually experience “technology farming” by getting a little pod with soil and choosing a seed of your choice.

Then, it is placed in a special receiver, and then go through this magic box… The screen starts to react immediately, and analyzed what seeds have been received. It showed a brief educational video first, then…

It started count down with a video of greens growing super fast out of the pods. We knew it was pre-recorded video, so I was not really that interested or excited about the video. But that was until we saw what came out of the magic box.

Look at these!!! Our pods came out with fully grown herbs!!! In a matter of 30 seconds or so, it went from seeds to fully grown herbs! How in a world???

They had a lovely chef waiting at the end to use our herbs as garnish to her dishes. My hubby picked peppermint seed, and I chose blue spice basil. She plucked our newly-grown herbs and put them on top of her Indian and vegan dishes. It was quite nice, especially thinking that it had our herbs on top! We were certainly amazed with all the set up Farm.One had here, and they also offer tours and classes at their farm. I would be very interested in visiting them!

Then, off to more innovative product. We spotted this maple syrup booth by Coombs Family Farms. They had a regular offerings like the syrup in a plastic jug, syrup in a glass jars…but then wait, what is that on the top? It looked like a spray cans of maple syrup! What! Well, it doesn’t really “spray” the syrup out (just imagine how messy that would be). Instead, the syrup comes out in a nice stream, hence the product name “Maple Stream.” Just point, stream, and enjoy. No fuss, no mess. Very convenient and easy to use! We even got to taste the organic maple syrup itself, and it was tasty! The lovely lady told us that the Maple Stream will be available starting January – February of 2019. Cool!

Another booth nearby was offering some meat from Honest Bison, but not chicken, beef, or pork. Instead, they were offering samples of venison (deer meat) and bison (buffalo meat). Their meats raised naturally and processed minimally, therefore, healthier and better for you. I’ve had both venison and bison before, so it was not that “unusual” kind of meats to me, but they are not the main offerings at most eateries. I hear that bison is healthier in general compared to beef, and with these alternative meats offerings, the production of beef can possibly go down?

Speaking of alternative option, I found an interesting booth by Algama. They had several kinds of mayo by The Good Spoon. Algama has R&D team that exploits nutritional quality of microalgae. The Good Spoon partnered with Algama and created the first ever vegan mayo with microalgae! It is an eggless mayo, but it tasted like mayo. Who knew something like this was possible? Way to go for those innovative minds!

There were a few restaurants who came out to the event as well. We visited Insa Brooklyn booth. The chef of Insa is also a chef at Good Fork in Brooklyn, we have been wanting to dine there for a looong time… The only time we made it out there, they were closed… Anyhow, we got to try their offering from Insa here, made with Gotham Greens Buttuce Lettuce Ssam with Soy Marinated Honest Bison, Early Girl Farm Mu Radish Kimchi, Pickled Perilla, and Ssam Jang. I thought it was really awesome that they were preparing the food with ingredients from other vendors! It was quite tasty, not too spicy but had a nice kick to it. Refreshing, fresh, and yummy.

Another booth that caught my eyes was Little Tong Noodle Shop. They were offering…well, not noodles. They had Rose Crystal Jelly with Black Rock Yuzu Syrup, Osmanthus, Peanuts, Mint and Basil. They looked like one of those rain drop cake things that I have seen everywhere a while ago, so I was excited to try one out finally! This one was…well, interesting. The jelly itself didn’t really have much flavor, and the texture was really weak. Added to that was all sorts of grainy stuffs, which didn’t really go well together with the jelly.

But not to worry, there were several booths offering some kind of alcohol to lift our spirits up at all time…LOL.

We wanted some kind of solid food, and just like that, we found the perfect booth. The Meat Hook was offering hot dog and cheese sausage. How do they fit in to this event? They invest in farms that practice regenerative agriculture, by focusing on health of the soil by raising and rotating pastures for 100% grass-fed beef and other meats. It is great to see such rewarding relationship between the butcher shop and farms.

Their sausages are made fresh from the animals, all made fresh in their shop. All in all, they offer more than 50 kinds of sausages! Wow! And their commitment to natural and high quality meat has won a trophy too! As I tried capture a staff cooking up the sausages, I got a great shot of big smiles! Thanks for the fun photo!

After having some high quality food samples in our tummy, we decided to get something a bit stronger than wine and beer. We found a booth with an impressive design, offering some of their tasty concoctions made with Whiskey. They were offering Pickled Ginger Buck and Cascara & Cider. So, we asked to sample one of each.

Pickled Ginger Buck is made with Bulleit Bourbon, Lemon, Ginger, and Soda. Cascara & Cider is made with Bulleit Rye, Cascara Syrup, and Local Apple Cider. The cider was nice and warm, with a slice of lemon. Both of them were really nice, mellow, tasty and relaxing.

After we got a bit mellowed out, we tried something that was quite strange… We visited a booth by Seek Food. Looked and sounded normal, yet it was all about crickets. Yes, insect crickets. They have tapped into the high protein that crickets has, and turned them into ingredients for food. They say crickets are more efficient, environmentally friendly, super healthy, and is the food of the future. We sampled their granola made with cricket flour. It was tasty and didn’t feel anything like eating an insect, since it was in powder form. I did not get completely sold on their products, I am not very comfortable to the idea of eating insects…yet. But it did sounded really cool though. 

Seek Food was not the only one promoting bugs as the food of the future. We saw a cook book specifically for insect eaters, called The Eat-a-Bug cookbook… And they had a few more of these kinds of cookbooks. They had all sorts of bugs, or “edible bugs” on display.

Then, they had a beautiful spread of food…with insects on and around them. Actually, the bugs were the main items on the dishes. I must say, even after the tasty whisky drink, I was still not brave enough to eat the bugs still in their own bug form…

Back to food without insects in or on or around them. We got some sample food from Almond, who was offering Roasted Long Island Duck Breast with KimchiJews Condiments. It was artfully presented, high quality and tasty. It was simple yet flavorful.

Once we got enough alcoholic beverages, and getting into the afternoon, we wanted something different, like coffee. We saw a booth that was offering coffee, so we headed over there. They had Dripkit Pourover Coffee, and we got to taste their El Mirador Dark from Columbia. We have had these types of pour over coffee in Japan for many years, so the concept itself was nothing new to me. Dripkit source their coffee from small farms and community coops, and have Kenyan and Columbian coffees. This one was quite tasty, really flavorful, deep and earthy, chocolatey and fruity. We really enjoyed their coffee. They also had croissant from Colson (or “son of Col” anyone?) Patisserie. The unassuming, ordinary-looking croissant was SUPER delicious!!! We had to go back and get some more! I wish if they had location in Manhattan, but we will travel to Brooklyn for good food…

This event also had many interesting live events, with different chefs and sponsors doing demonstrations. One of the popular spot was pizza making one. They had fresh dough ready, and one staff formed them into pizza pie shape. Then, it was passed down to the chef for toppings. It was put into GE pizza oven.

We got to try some fresh-baked pizza slices, hot right out the oven! They were so tasty! I don’t really know what kind of pizza these were, but with fresh dough and fresh ingredients, they were oh-so-satisfying. It is so great that you could have pizza oven at home if you had the money and space at home.

I saw some people carrying super cute drinks, so I went to find where they came from. It was offered at Rhum Barbancourt bar. Their bar was quite fancy with beautiful flowers everywhere.

They were making a cocktail called Cha-Yen, made with Rhum Babancourt White, Coconut Water, Lime, and Thai Tea Syrup. It was topped off with different colored flowers, making it extra fancy. It was sweet with Thai tea, coconut and Rhum. Strong and tasty, it was nice and tropical. A bit too sweet to me, so I would get a huge glass-full of it, but this portion was just perfect.

Then, I saw some ice cream offering! We went right over to Eat Me Ice Cream booth. They had two kinds of floats there, one called Umami & Smoke, made with Nori and Wakame ice cream and a kick of scotch in ginger kombucha. Another one was Chocolate ice cream which was dairy-free, plant-based ice cream also in kombucha. I really liked their ice cream, but the flavor of kombucha was so overpowering, I didn’t like the float as a whole. I wish if they just offered scoops of ice cream on their own, so that we could really appreciate the flavor of their ice cream.

Another sample we tried was protein drink from Remedy Organics. Their drinks are certified USDA organic, vegan, gluten-free, dairy-free, and soy-free. They make their drink with Nut Milks, Superfoods, Ayurvedics, Botanical Herbs and Probiotics. So, overall super healthy drink that is also satisfying. We tried a couple of flavors, and they were pretty tasty.

We had a cute sample from Wünder Creamery as well. Their yogurt is made with grass-fed whole milk, no GMO in there, with lower sugar and more protein and probiotic. All around good-for-you snack. I know that many of the yogurt we see in the supermarket has loads and loads of sugar, making it actually not healthy. Their yogurt has only nine grams of sugar added, which was nice. And the flavors, they had unique offerings like Coffee and Matcha. We tried these ones, and they were quite delicious. Creamy, not sour at all, and could really taste the coffee and matcha. Nice sweetness without being too much. I really liked them!

We had one more solid food before we called it quits (we were getting so full, we couldn’t have any more food…). It was from Gramercy Tavern, Fall Vegetable Salad, made with Gotham Greens Romain, Smallhold Mushrooms, and Australis Barramundi Croquettes. The croquette was quite tasty, packed with flavor. The veggies were really nice too, it was a bowl full of joy. A perfect food item to end the all-you-can-eat part of the event.

The last item we tried with interesting ingredient was milk from Oatly. When I thought I have seen all of the non-dairy milk out there, this company proved me wrong. Their milk is a vegan, plant-based milk alternative made from gluten-free oats. Yes, oats, the grain. Their milk is made with oat and water, with some special technologies and processes to turn them into milk. They had milk that was made especially for coffee, called Barista Edition Oatmilk. How interesting! So we tried that. And then, we tried their other chilled milk too. I tried the Chocolate Oat Milk. It tasted like how the first generation of soy milk tasted…very…”grainy” if you know what I mean. I was not a big fan of their chilled milk, the grain flavor was a bit too strong in the milk for me. But, it is great to see another kind of milk alternative offering out there!

The last item with the coolest technology that we tried was the coffee from Edible Selfie. They use edible water-soluble ink and print your selfie on cookies, macarons, and in this case, whipped cream over coffee!

The ink used is FDA certified, so they are safe to eat. The ink has no flavor, just adding colors to your food or drink. The machine was quite impressive, it only took a few minutes to print the images, and they were ready to go! We got our selfie printed on the iced coffee with whipped cream. They provided eco-friendly straws, and we enjoyed drinking our faces… When I mixed the whipped cream and coffee, the ink did make the whip cream into dirty gray, but that can’t be helped when using ink…no negative affect on the flavor though. It was certainly the most fun item they had at this event! And yes, you can hire them for your next big party!

At the end, we were completely stuffed with drinks and food, while learning so much about the food-related technology, innovation and improvements out there. It was such a great event, I am so glad we had the opportunity to attend this event! It makes me feel better that so many people out there are working to better the future of food, by focusing on environment, sustainability and health of people and animals. Thank you everyone who sponsored and exhibited at this event! If you want to learn more, you should check out the event for next year! In a meanwhile, check out their website!

 

Food Loves Tech 2018 – Industry City, 274 36th St, Brooklyn, NY