bake - March 2012 - PAN40

A Fusion of Flavors
Detroit is home to an increasingly diverse group of cultures, a trend that is shaping the appetite of the city’s 4.9 million residents. The rapidly growing part of Detroit known as “Mexican Town” is enjoying a renaissance – not only because more Hispanics are moving into the area, but because people of other cultures are flocking to Mexican Town to enjoy a fusion of flavors. There are many examples of cross-cultural foods inside Detroit’s popular panaderías. At MexicanTown Bakery in Detroit, you find traditional Hispanic baked goods alongside chocolatefilled cannoli, decorated cupcakes and unique grab-and-go foods like pepperoni-filled bolillos. Sheila’s Bakery features many flavors of tres leches cakes (such as vanilla, strawberry, cappuccino, and piña colada), but also caters to other cultures with its fresh fruitfilled marble cakes and popular new fruit cocktail cups (filled with apple, pineapple, pecans, raisins, sour cream, heavy cream and condensed milk). African-Americans commonly frequent Sheila’s to order large tres leches cakes with elaborate decorations. “Even for a simple birthday party, they order a big cake,” says Rogelio Gomez, the head baker at Sheila’s. MexicanTown Bakery president Omar Hernandez notices the changing culinary trends of Detroit, which is gaining a reputation for terrific Hispanic cuisine. Even the city’s large grocery chains, like Meijer, are carrying more foods popular with Hispanics, like plantains. “Here we sell a strawberry fruit tart for $2.95,” Hernandez says of his bakery, which opened at its current location in 1995. “People love our prices, because they say they will pay three times as much for a strawberry tart at a traditional supermarket, and our strawberries are bigger and fresher. This bakery has an advantage in that a lot of Americans and Canadians who visit our restaurant next door come to our bakery after dinner for dessert.”
BOON FOR BAKERY

Hispanics now comprise 16 percent of the U.S. population and the U.S. Census indicates the U.S. Hispanic population is expected to grow 34 percent from 2010 to 2020. The NPD Group, a leading market research company that has been tracking America’s eating behaviors for the last three decades, is finding that the growth of the U.S. Hispanic population combined with their adherence to dining traditions is beginning to influence national

consumption patterns. One of the categories where Hispanics are influencing consumption patterns is at breakfast, according to NPD’s NET (National Eating Trends) Hispanic, which is a year-long study that captures the in-home and away-from-home food and beverage consumption habits of Hispanics in the U.S. by level of acculturation. NET Hispanic reports that while non-Hispanics include non-toasted bread in two percent of their breakfast meals, 12 percent of Hispanics’ breakfasts include nontoasted bread. Over the last decade, typical consumers decreased the number of times they include non-toasted bread with their breakfasts. NPD’s National Eating Trends (NET) shows that for the two years ending February 2001, the average American had 48 eatings of non-toasted bread at breakfast, which declined to 41 eatings for the two years ending February 2011. While non-toasted bread appears to be the breakfast carbohydrate of choice in Hispanic homes, other breakfast options are consumed less often compared to nonHispanics’ consumption. For example, hot cereal has a 10 percent share of non-Hispanic breakfast eatings, while that number for Hispan-

MARCH 12

PANADERIA

bake - March 2012

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