Closer to home: Food trends uk 2025

When it comes to the Closer to Home trend, i.e. Scottish, Irish and Welsh cuisine, consumers find their associations with tradition and comfort food appealing right now, as well as the opportunity to support Scottish suppliers. Some of the Scottish dishes we found to be most popular, that encapsulate these associations, include Aberdeen Angus steak and Scottish salmon, as well as a choices like Scotch pies, a savoury meat pie, stovies, a traditional Scottish stew made with meat, potatoes and onions, Lorne sausage, a square sausage usually made with minced beef, rusk or breadcrumbs, and cock-a-leekie soup, a chicken soup made with chicken stock, leeks, and often celery, rice or barley.

Lamb, leeks, and cheese are very popular ingredients associated with Welsh cuisine. These are reflected in some of the Welsh dishes our research found to be most popular. These include Welsh rarebit, which is toasted bread, topped with hot cheese sauce, flavoured with ale, mustard and Worcestershire sauce, Welsh cakes, fruit cakes cooked on a griddle, oggies, which are pasties filled with lamb or mutton, leeks and potatoes, cawl, a traditional meat and vegetable broth, as well as Glamorgan sausage, which is a traditional vegetarian sausage made with cheese, leeks and breadcrumbs.

Some of the traditional and comforting dishes that we found most popular with consumers in our research included: potato farls, literally ‘fourths’ which are savoury cakes made from a dough made with mashed potato, soda bread, a traditional loaf made with bicarbonate of soda rather than yeast, Irish coddle which is a stew made with ingredients like sausage, bacon, potatoes, onions, barley and stout, colcannon a dish of mashed potatoes and cabbage, as well as boxty, which is a potato pancake.

With our Closer to Home trend, which encompasses Scottish, Irish and Welsh cuisines, there are some fantastic examples of local produce, that you can feature as seasonal additions to your menu. Seasonal ingredients don’t just have to be fruit and vegetables, as fresh meat and poultry and fish and seafood also seasonal follow seasonal cycles too. Leeks and lamb are ingredients that feature in many Welsh recipes. Leeks are typically in season from late summer through early spring, and lamb is generally available from June to January. Scotland has a great reputation for its raspberries and other berries which are in season around June and July.

We found that 43% of consumers would like to try Scottish, Welsh and Irish cuisines, with a further 36% already eating them. Of these, 43% of those felt that these cuisines are hearty and comforting*, and this is no wonder with some of the most popular dishes being stews, soups, pies, sausages, and including ingredients like potatoes, leeks and cheese, and fresh seasonal produce. Some delicious examples of these are: stovies, a traditional Scottish stew made with meat, potatoes and onions, colcannon an Irish dish of mashed potatoes and cabbage, and oggies, which are Welsh pasties filled with lamb or mutton, leeks and potatoes.