Some food trends feel inescapable until they suddenly do not. That is what happened to several ingredients that defined 2023 and now barely get a mention outside niche menus and product launches.
The shift matters because ingredient crazes shape what restaurants buy, what grocery stores stock, and what shoppers think is worth trying. In 2023, these nine ingredients were everywhere in the US. In 2024 and into 2025, the conversation moved on.
Ube
Ube, the purple yam long popular in Filipino cooking, had a major breakout in US food culture in 2023. It showed up in doughnuts, ice cream, lattes, pancake mixes, cookies, and limited-time desserts at both independent bakeries and national chains. Its bright violet color made it especially strong on Instagram and TikTok, where visual appeal often drives trial.
The ingredient did not disappear, but its novelty wore off fast. By late 2024, retailers and café operators were giving more attention to pistachio, matcha, and nostalgic flavors tied to childhood desserts. Ube remained respected, especially in Filipino-owned businesses, but it was no longer being treated as the next big mainstream flavor.
That change says as much about trend cycles as it does about taste. Once consumers recognized ube on sight, it stopped feeling new. For many brands, that was enough to shift promotional dollars elsewhere.
Hot Honey
Hot honey was one of the clearest crossover ingredients of 2023. It moved from pizza shops and chicken sandwiches into snack mixes, salad dressings, marinades, frozen foods, and fast-casual menu specials. The formula was easy to understand: sweetness, heat, and a little flexibility across meals and dayparts.
What cooled was not demand so much as excitement. By 2024, hot honey had become a pantry staple instead of a headline ingredient. When an item becomes normal, it tends to lose trend status, even if people keep buying it.
There was also more competition in the sweet-heat space. Chili crisp, Calabrian chile spreads, spicy maple, and fermented pepper sauces gave chefs and product developers more options. Hot honey stayed on menus, but it stopped dominating food talk the way it did in 2023.
Tinned Fish
Tinned fish had a surprisingly glamorous run in 2023. Sardines, mussels, mackerel, anchovies, and trout became centerpieces for snack boards, dinner parties, and specialty retail displays. Social media helped recast canned seafood from old pantry item to stylish, protein-rich luxury with attractive packaging and a European feel.
Part of the appeal was practical. Inflation pushed some shoppers toward shelf-stable foods, and tinned fish fit the moment. It offered protein, convenience, and a sense of discovery, especially through imported brands and small producers.
But the craze cooled as quickly as it rose. For many Americans, tinned fish remained more of a one-time curiosity than a permanent habit. As grocery prices stayed high, shoppers often returned to familiar proteins, and the online fascination around fish boards lost steam.
Pickle Flavor
Pickle flavor was hard to avoid in 2023. It appeared in chips, popcorn, nuts, wings, cocktails, seltzers, and fast-food sauces. Major snack brands leaned into dill-heavy limited editions, while restaurants used pickle brine and pickle seasoning as a shortcut to salty, sour intensity.
The trend tapped into several consumer preferences at once. It felt nostalgic, bold, and easy to understand. It also fit neatly into the growing American appetite for acidic flavors and punchy snacks.
Still, there is a limit to how much pickle flavor most people want. By 2024, many of the launches felt repetitive, and newer sour-spicy combinations began getting more attention. Pickle remained popular as a supporting note, but fewer brands treated it like a star ingredient.
Chili Crisp
Chili crisp had been building for years, but 2023 was the point when it went fully mainstream in the US. It landed in supermarket aisles nationwide, spread beyond Asian specialty stores, and became a default add-on for eggs, noodles, pizza, dumplings, and even vanilla ice cream. Crunch, heat, oil, and umami gave it broad appeal.
Its fade is relative. Chili crisp is still widely sold and used, but the media obsession has cooled. In trend terms, it moved from discovery stage to established condiment, which usually means less coverage and fewer splashy menu callouts.
There is also the issue of category crowding. As more brands entered the market, the ingredient became less distinctive. What felt exciting in 2023 began to feel expected by the following year.
Cottage Cheese
Cottage cheese staged one of the oddest comebacks of 2023. Fueled heavily by TikTok, it was blended into pasta sauces, frozen into bark, whipped into dips, and added to breakfast bowls and high-protein desserts. Its rise lined up with the strong consumer push toward protein-rich foods and practical grocery spending.
Unlike some other trends, this one was tied less to flavor than to function. Cottage cheese was cheap, familiar, and high in protein, which made it useful content for creators and appealing to shoppers trying to stretch food budgets.
Even so, the hype faded. Greek yogurt, protein drinks, and higher-protein packaged snacks regained attention, and many home cooks lost interest in forcing cottage cheese into every recipe. Sales stayed solid, but the cultural buzz dropped sharply.
Yuzu
Yuzu had a sophisticated moment in 2023, especially in beverages, desserts, sauces, and chef-driven fast-casual menus. The Japanese citrus fruit was marketed as a fresher, more refined alternative to lemon or lime, with floral notes that sounded premium to diners looking for something new.
Its problem was accessibility. Fresh yuzu is limited in the US, and many products relied on concentrates, purees, or flavorings. That made it harder for everyday shoppers to build a lasting connection with the ingredient beyond restaurant menus and specialty items.
As a result, yuzu remained more admired than adopted. By 2024, calamansi, sudachi, and even plain citrus blends started taking some of the spotlight in trend reporting, while yuzu settled back into a smaller premium niche.
Butter Boards
Butter boards were less an ingredient than a vehicle for one, but butter itself became a headline food in 2023 in a way that felt unusually trend-driven. Whipped, salted, topped with herbs or honey, and spread across serving boards, butter became a social centerpiece at gatherings and in food media.
The format was easy to copy and photograph, which helped it spread. It also arrived during a period when indulgence had real appeal, especially after years of health-first messaging and leaner eating trends.
Then the idea hit saturation. Food safety concerns, repetition, and the return of more practical entertaining formats pushed butter boards out of the conversation. Butter never left American kitchens, of course, but its brief star turn as a viral ingredient was over.
Pandan
Pandan, known for its grassy vanilla-like aroma and deep roots in Southeast Asian cooking, gained wider US attention in 2023. It appeared in cakes, waffles, coffee drinks, syrups, and bakery cases, often highlighted for its vivid green color and distinctive scent. Like ube, it benefited from visual appeal and interest in regional Asian flavors.
But pandan faced the same challenge many breakout ingredients do. Widespread curiosity did not automatically become mainstream staying power. For a lot of consumers, it remained something they tried once at a bakery rather than an ingredient they actively sought out later.
It also competed in a crowded field of dessert flavors. As trend attention shifted toward pistachio, sesame, and globally inspired nostalgia, pandan slipped out of everyday food conversation even though it continues to matter deeply in the cuisines that made it famous.
