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Seasonal Baking: Spring

Seasonal Baking: Spring

By: Bob's Red Mill | March 29 2018
It’s a well-known trend that people seem to naturally crave certain flavors and ingredients during different times of the year. It’s common to gravitate to peppermint and chocolate during the Christmas and winter season, or pumpkin, apple, and cinnamon flavors during Thanksgiving and fall. Meanwhile, fruity, simple, and fresh seem to be the best descriptors of flavors that are most in demand during the spring. These flavor trends hold true for baked goods just as much as anything else. The onset of spring brings vibrant colors and delicious smells. People tend to veer toward lighter fare in general, and that includes lighter desserts. Think mild, tart flavors, and a fun kaleidoscope of hues.

Spring Colors

Seasonal Baking: Spring _ Bob’s Red Mill Popular spring colors are often pastels. These are all the pretty pinks, yellows, greens, and blues that you see most often around the Easter holiday. But pastels aren’t the only colors that signal spring. Vibrant hues like bright green, fuchsia, and even deep purple are also in demand. If fall is the season of earthy, muted, and blended colors with warm overtones, then spring is the season of bright, vibrant colors in every shade of the rainbow, with cooler undertones. When you walk down a grocery store aisle and all you see is an explosion of yellows, greens, pinks, and blues, you can rest assured that spring is upon you, and Easter is right around the corner.

Spring Trends

For spring trends, baked goods like cupcakes and tart-flavored key lime and lemon meringue pies are common choices. Light and fluffy lemon-flavored pound cake (or these Chewy Lemon Sugar Cookies) and different flavors of angel food cake and strawberry shortcake, all topped with fresh fruits and citrus-infused glazes, are also big winners. When you think of spring, the word fresh comes to mind. So, anything, where you can incorporate fresh fruit as part of the presentation, is always a hit, especially if combined with year-round favorites like chocolate. The use of fondant for things like cookies and muffins is being seen more often too, plus lots of baked goods in individual portions, like mini-tarts or mini-cupcakes. Cheesecake is another spring season crowd favorite, although arguably, it’s a crowd favorite all year long! Whether it's a cheesecake topped with a delicious fruit topping or these fun Easter Cheesecake Macarons filled with a fruity cheesecake filling, 'tis the season for all things cheesecake.

Popular Spring Flavors and Ingredients

Along with the flavors of citrus fruits like lemon, lime, tangerine, and orange, flavors like coconut and banana are big too, such as this Coconut Lime Banana Bread with Lime Glaze recipe. Berries like strawberries or the blueberries in this Gluten Free Lemon Blueberry Cake recipe are also wildly popular. Other flavors that are hot with the springtime crowd are sweet cream, buttercream, butter pecan (like these 6 Ingredient Butter Pecan Cookies), and pretty much anything with the word butter in it! Cinnamon can also be a popular flavor during spring, especially when it’s light and fluffy cinnamon rolls topped with delicious cream cheese icing. Flavors like cherry, rhubarb (Strawberry Rhubarb Upside-Down Cake anyone?), mint, mango, peach, and watermelon are also favorites for the warmer months. Springtime is a season of fresh starts, new beginnings, and endless possibilities. Baked goods and desserts that reflect that spring season sense of fun and adventure, that are light, flavorful, and satisfying, are the goods and desserts that withstand the test of time. Ultimately though, there are no hard and fast rules when it comes to seasonal baking, whether it’s during the spring, summer, winter, or fall. With any season, there are undeniably certain trends, flavors, and ingredients that do tend to be more prevalent than others. So, it’s always a good idea to pay attention to them, but don’t be afraid to think outside of the box. Paying attention to seasonal trends is part of the art that is baking, but so is willing to experiment!
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HolidaysEasterSpring

1 Comment

  1. m a furuta
    m a furuta
    June 16 2023 at 5:17 am
    I miss your Irish Soda Bread - you made it so easy to make a loaf - which I might add was consumed happily minutes after it emerged from my oven.
    Reply ↓

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