Teya Vitu, The Daily Record Newswire
You spoon that 5.3-ounce container of Greek yogurt while watching a Major League Soccer match on television and multi-task by following the game on Twitter, maybe even clicking a photo off with your Smartphone and posting it on Facebook with the same phone. Bet you weren’t doing any of the above three or four years ago.
We are in a hyper-modern era. So many things commonplace, even indispensable, today did not exist as recently as five years ago, sometimes less, in many cases not 10 years ago and certainly not in the 20th century.
Widespread wineries and microbrew beers across America, for example, are a 21st century phenomenon. True, the Egyptians imbibed both 4,000 years ago, but the mom-and-pop winery industry has only flourished in the past 15 years. Every state now has wineries, which was not the case at the turn of the century.
Beer, like wine and all foods in general, has seen flavor awakenings among Americans across the country. This, coupled with technological advances allowing hobbyists to become commercial brewers, has led to a proliferation of microbreweries nationwide in the 21st century. Nationwide, there were 377 microbreweries in 2000 and some 3,200 operating now with an average 1.5 microbreweries opening every day, according to the Brewers Association.
Greek yogurt in U.S. supermarkets can be traced back to Chobani’s birth in 2007 , and later its expansion to Twin Falls in 2012. Then suddenly other yogurt manufactures took notice and in the brief span of 2010-11, Greek yogurt matured from a couple brands to pretty much every yogurt manufacturer introducing its own variant of the stiffer fermented milk product. Does anybody still eat regular yogurt?
The gourmet food truck craze just about everywhere traces back to a single food truck launched in Los Angeles in just 2008. Roy Choi and his Mexican-Korean Kogi food trucks were pioneers in employing Twitter to announce store locations. .
The latest revolution is one still so new that it has a very select foothold in a number of cities. That is the Liege waffle. It looks like any other waffle, but this variant from the eastern Belgian town of Liege is a whole different story.
The Liege waffle starts as yeast-risen dough balls that are pressed into the waffle iron. Belgian pearl sugar caramelizes to create a crunchy outside and chewy, airy inside.
Back in 2011, Liege waffles were rare. I stumbled upon a menu with the Liege waffle at Chicago Waffles in Chicago. Google at that time didn’t turn up much more. Now quite a few cities offer one or two breakfast joints that offer the Liege waffle.
Then there’s sriracha. Who was spicing their food up with that condiment before, what, about 2009? Quinoa and kale have been the rage for maybe three or four years? Quinoa imports have increased 10-fold since 2007, and, according to food industry consulting group Technomic, kale has seen a 400 percent increase on restaurant menus since 2008.
Beyond food, the most cataclysmic hyper-modern development is gay marriage in the United States. In 2012, just nine states allowed same-sex marriage and only two of them were not in the Northeast. Now we’re at 36 states and by the time summer rolls around the U.S. Supreme Court could well sanctify marriage between same-sex couples across the country. Even more hyper-modern is the American societal shift toward gay acceptance in as few as the past five years.
On the sports front, has the United States finally joined the rest of the world as a soccer nation? In just the last couple years, soccer-specific stadiums have been built for Major League Soccer teams, and they are filling up with fans in numbers nearly matching a third of the teams in the English Premier League and German Bundesliga. There are boisterous crows in Seattle and Portland, at least, comparable to those in England.
Social media and the portable technology to perpetrate instant sharing fall in the hyper-modern docket. Before 2006, nobody except insiders had a Facebook account and nobody tweeted. Even in 2010, Facebook had just 500 million members across the planet. Now there are 1 billion-plus Facebook accounts. Digital cameras became commonplace in a precise year, 2002. Now snapshots are
captured on the only telephone many people have.
If one hyper-modern development pleases me more than any other (beyond the Liege waffle), I’d side with the Xlerator and Dyson Air Blade public restroom hand dryers. I first encountered the jet turbine caliber Xlerator at a Philips 66 service station in Marfa, Texas, in 2006. Occasionally, I came upon Xlerators and smiled at the prospect of having my hands dry in just about 10 seconds. Then, I came upon the Dyson Air Blade in 2011, another machine able to dry hands in 10-or-so-seconds. No need to wipe hands dry on pant legs.
By 2020, what will we be eating and doing that we are entirely unaware of today?
—————
Teya Vitu is a reporter who covers real estate and construction for the Idaho Business Review.
