Dishing up 2017

The Year of the Rooster promises to inspire chicken dishes across China. [Photo provided to China Daily]

From more pop-ups to more Michelin madness, the year looks like it could be delicious－and healthier, too. Mike Peters reports.

What can we expect on restaurant menus as we enter a new year?

Some of the trends that got a start in 2016 will surely continue, such as pop-up restaurants and events. Bowls－those one-dish meals that have been hits in Beijing (the Hatchery) and Shanghai (Little Catch and Bowl'd) are also surely destined to continue their runs, in part because they are great options for delivery orders.

Other foodie enthusiasms will be new, including the world's discovery of something Chinese have known all along: Sorghum is cool.

The earthy grain has been long appreciated in China: It's the heart of baijiu, China's national white liquor, and the title character of Mo Yan's novel Red Sorghum and the subsequent hit film. But sorghum has never gotten much respect in the West, where it's mostly grown to feed farm animals.

That's going to change this year, say food and nutrition experts.

Christy Brissette, the Washington Post's nutrition writer, reports from the recent Food and Nutrition Conference and Expo in Boston that sorghum is definitely in. Quinoa－the darling of the past 12 months? So last year.