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The Spoon

Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

Tik Tok

Recipe Sharing App Whisk an Early Test Partner for TikTok’s New Jump Program

This week TikTok officially launched its Jump program, a new feature which allows third party apps to integrate with the hugely popular social video app. The new integration allows someone watching a TikTok video to click on a button to access features of apps directly from inside TikTok

Recipe sharing app Whisk is an early integration partner with TikTok, which makes sense since cooking is one of TikTok’s most popular genres. The partnership, which Techcrunch wrote about in February, started as part of an “alpha testing” trial with a small group of TikTok creators that Whisk helped identify. With today’s announcement, the feature is being rolled out to wider group of creators (though not all). TikTok said it will roll out the feature more widely after some testing.

The TikTok-Whisk integration, which you can see in action above, works like this: TikTok users who are watching a cooking video can tap a Save to Whisk button that will allow them to view the recipe in Whisk. Users can also add the recipe to a collection or a meal plan, or have the recipe converted to a shopping list they could have delivered via one of Whisk’s grocery delivery partners (e.g., Walmart, Instacart).

For Whisk’s part, the integration is a no-brainer and could be a huge source of potential traffic for the recipe app. Whisk, which is now part of Samsung, was already growing pretty quickly; connecting its app with TikTok’s hugely popular cooking content will only accelerate that growth.

Looking forward, chances are other food and recipe apps will follow Whisk’s lead as TikTok opens up its program more widely for integration. Social media is where many consumers look for their next meal idea, and the social video app has become a viral recipe kingmaker. With Jump, recipe app makers now can monetize that viral interest in baked feta pasta by converting social video watchers to customers through shoppable recipes.

Food Tech News: Tik Tok Creator’s Menu and Biodegradable Bacardi Bottles

Happy Halloween! This year’s holiday will certainly look different, but I know I will be checking out the full moon, making my own chocolate peanut butter cups, and watching The Shining. Maybe you can find joy in creating a candy chute or developing your own candy delivering robot for trick-or-treaters. Or, you can spend some time catching up on food tech news like Tik Tok’s new food menu, biodegradable Bacardi bottles, Whole Foods’ predictions for new food trends, and adaptogen coffee pods.

Tik Tok partners with Postmates for “Creator’s Menu”

Tik Tok has skyrocketed in popularity amongst millennials this year, with the majority of its users between the ages of 16-24. To capitalize on this demographic, Tik Tok partnered with Postmates to create a menu of this year’s most popular food trends that millennials are salivating over. Available from October 28 to November 22, local restaurants in Los Angeles will be serving up their versions of whipped coffee, cloud bread, pancake cereal, and a bento box. These are the food trends on Tik Tok that have reached between 259 million to 3 billion hashtags. With the whipped coffee going for $7.50 and the bento box $20, this is a price only a millennial could justify.

Photo from Bacardi

Biodegradable Bacardi Bottles

Bacardi has started using bottles that look exactly like regular plastic, except for the fact that these bottles are apparently able to break down in the trash, both outside and in the ocean. The material used to make the bottle is called polyhydroxyalkanoate (PHA), and its main component is canola oil. Danimer Scientific, which makes this material, feeds canola oil (which contains carbon dioxide that was stored in the plant) to bacteria. The bacteria then turns this into PHA, which is extracted to make plastic-like products. Companies like Nestlé and PepsiCo are also using this material for packaging.

Whole Food predicts food trends of 2021

Whole Foods released its annual food predictions for the upcoming year, and it should come as no surprise that plant-based foods are a trend that is predicted to continue on an upward trajectory next year. Healthy baby food, chickpea-based foods, vegetable jerky, and upcycled foods are some on the list. Out of all the predictions made, my personal favorite is alcoholic kombucha.

Adaptogenic, compostable coffee pods from Hong Kong

Hong Kong-based Beams Coffee combines the trends of gourmet coffee and adaptogens in its compostable pods. Adaptogens are plants and herbs that are supposed to help the body combat stressors, and Beams Coffee uses medicinal mushrooms like Cordyceps, Lion’s mane, Reishi, and Tremella. These mushrooms are paired with specialty coffee from Sydney and Melbourne and come in pods that are 95 percent sugarcane-based. The coffee pods are available in four varieties including beauty, mind, energy, and immunity, and are compatible with the Nespresso maker.