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FoodEntertainment

by Dara Morgan

How TikTok Trends Impact the Global Food Industry

15 May 2025

Image: Midjourney x The Sandy Times

Probably you watch TikTok (or the slightly more adult version — Instagram reels, like I do). And probably, somewhere between a robotic dog doing a dance and a guy rubbing his face with a banana peel, you have stumbled upon a food trend. Frozen grapes? Dried yoghurt? Super spicy Buldak noodles? Yes, we have all been there — sometimes willingly.
And of course, unless you live in a WiFi-less cave somewhere in the middle of nowhere (and if so, how are you reading this?), you must have heard of Dubai chocolate. It looks glossy. It glistens. It is gold-wrapped, pistachio-stuffed, and algorithmically designed to go viral.
But beneath the sparkle and melted chocolate lies a slightly less delicious truth. When something goes viral — really viral — it doesn't just mess with your sense of taste. It can wreak havoc on supply chains, inflate prices, and set off a domino effect that ends in, say, deforestation, economic instability, or your local shop running out of cucumbers.
So what happens when everyone wants the same snack at once?
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Photo: blackieshoot

Pistachio deficit (thank you, Dubai chocolate)

Dubai chocolate is something, right? Bursting onto the scene in late 2023, it became an overnight star — the kind of sweet treat people would queue for, post about, and then pretend they “always liked before it went mainstream.” Even Lindt jumped in with its own pistachio line, as did Läderach, because no one wants to be left out of a gold-wrapped trend.
The secret to its success? A few things, really. Dubai chocolate is very photogenic — ideal for those slow-mo ASMR clips where people snap it. But it also tastes indulgent, with creamy milk chocolate, crunchy knafeh pastry, and a luscious pistachio filling.
So, what could possibly go wrong? Spoiler: pistachios. It was always going to be pistachios.
Turns out TikTok isn't just for dance routines and cats in sunglasses. It now has the power to wobble agricultural economies. The Dubai chocolate trend sent pistachio demand through the roof — particularly for kernels, which are mostly grown in the United States and Iran. The price of kernels leapt from $7.65 to $10.30 per pound in a single year.
And the timing could not have been worse. The US harvest had already been disappointing — small in volume, and high in quality, meaning most of it was sold in-shell. That left fewer of the shell-less kernels chocolatiers desperately needed to stuff into luxury bars.
Iran, not to be outdone, upped its pistachio exports to the UAE by 40 percent. And still, it wasn't enough. Prestat, a swish British chocolate brand, was caught off-guard. “It feels like it came out of nowhere,” said its general manager. But suddenly, pistachio chocolate was in every corner shop — and some of them were rationing it.
The moral? TikTok giveth, TikTok taketh away. And if your favourite nut disappears, you now know who to blame: a dessert nicknamed Can’t Get Knafeh of It.
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Photo: Alexander Mils

Avocado and the deforestation drama

Nothing sounds healthier than avocado toast. It is green, creamy, photogenic, and looks fantastic next to your minimalist tableware. It is rich in good fats, somehow vegan and indulgent at the same time, and it travels well — from Mexican groves to your brunch spot in DIFC.
But here is the thing: the global obsession with avocados has turned into a proper environmental mess.
In 2023, a New York Times exposé (powered by data from Climate Rights International) revealed the extent of illegal deforestation in Mexico linked to avocado farming. Every day, more than 10 football fields of forest were being cleared — often without permits, and frequently within protected areas like the Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve. All so the world could keep spreading green mush on toast.
And that was just the tip of the (rapidly melting) iceberg. In Michoacán, the heart of Mexico’s avocado trade, criminal groups moved in. They demanded protection payments, seized land, and even built illegal water reservoirs by hollowing out the landscape. Satellite imagery showed how new orchards cropped up on deforested land, many of which exported directly to the United States — despite being, well, wildly illegal.
This green gold rush has linked avocados to extortion, water theft, and even fatal violence. “Behind every avocado… there is a bloodstain,” said one local farmer who had been kidnapped for protesting deforestation. And no, that isn't a metaphor.
Thankfully, someone did something. US NGOs and lawmakers pressured companies to clean up their supply chains. In response, Mexico launched an orchard verification system using GPS to check which farms were legal. Mission Produce, one of the biggest avocado importers, committed to buying only from approved sources. Others followed.
Still, the demand hasn't dipped. Avocado exports to the US rose 48 percent since 2019, and the industry is now worth $3 billion a year. So next time you fork into your brunch, remember: you aren't just eating toast. You are participating in a complicated web of politics, policy, and something of a Netflix series.
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Photo: Nanxi wei

Cucumber panic: The Icelandic edition

Cucumbers: harmless, hydrating, rarely involved in scandal. Or at least that was the case before Iceland lost its mind over a TikTok cucumber salad.
Normally, when you see a recipe online, you might save it, send it to a friend with “we should try this,” and then forget about it for eternity. But not this time. The cucumber salad was too easy. Grated cucumber, sesame oil, garlic, rice vinegar, chilli oil — done in five minutes, and suddenly you feel like a minimalist chef in a Scandi thriller.
Thanks to Canadian TikToker Logan Moffitt — aka “cucumber guy” — this salad became the dish in Iceland. The nation, population 393,000, collectively decided to eat their weight in cucumbers. Sales of the vegetable more than doubled. Supermarket shelves emptied. Farmers panicked.
One grocery chain tried to deny that the shortage was linked to TikTok — but then admitted that ingredients like sesame oil were also mysteriously flying off the shelves. Coincidence? Please.
The country's farming body confirmed that cucumber supply had temporarily collapsed. Greenhouses were not producing enough, schools had just reopened (putting extra pressure on supplies), and farmers were between planting cycles. So yes, everything happened at once.
In a bigger country, it might not have made headlines. But in Iceland, this was practically a national crisis. “It’s the first time we’ve experienced something like this,” said a local agriculture rep, probably while clutching a half-eaten salad.
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Photo: Patrick

Feta cheese and the baked pasta buzz

If you are old enough to remember 2021 — which already feels like a previous life — you might recall a certain recipe that broke the internet and then, very nearly, the global cheese supply: baked feta pasta.
The idea was disarmingly simple. One baking dish. A block of feta. A handful of cherry tomatoes. Pasta on standby. Bake, mash, stir. Done. It tasted… fine. Not exactly revolutionary. But the buzz? Off the charts.
Originally posted by Finnish food blogger Jenni Häyrinen, the recipe did alright at first. Then it went full supernova on TikTok, racking up hundreds of millions of views. Suddenly, feta was not just cheese — it was content. And when something becomes content, it stops being affordable.
Shops across the United States (and beyond) reported massive shortages. Trader Joe’s? Empty. Walmart? Out. Even your neighbourhood cheesemonger started giving you side-eye if you asked for a second block. Sales surged by more than 200 percent. Kroger’s specialty cheese manager called it “the largest and most geographically broad sales spike in a single product I have ever seen,” which is perhaps not what he expected to say about Greek dairy in his lifetime.
Before this, most supermarkets only stocked cow’s milk feta. But as the craving hit fever pitch, sheep- and goat-milk versions (previously reserved for food snobs and Mediterranean aunts) became mainstream. Krinos Foods, which had long begged retailers to carry the real stuff, suddenly could not ship it fast enough.
So next time you find yourself tempted to cook something viral and post immediatel, pause. Ask yourself: is this a snack or a supply chain incident waiting to happen?
Sometimes, doing nothing is the most sustainable act of all.