Stocking-filler news is all seasonal and about food habits, new and old

The seasonal news drought (not that there’s less news, just that everyone wants to go on holiday) is upon us all so its food stories that dominate.

Consider three recent items:

• cinnamon-gate in Denmark, where the nation’s bakers are brandishing rolling pins against the European Union’s new guidelines on acceptable levels of cinnamon in traditional/seasonal food and in everyday baked goods
• Germans’ growing disinclination to eat Lebkuchen, the spiced gingerbread-like Christmas treat, as evident from a 22% fall in production in the three years from 2009
• Marmite’s falling sales in the UK and the rise in popularity of Rowse Honey

Food is a failsafe story – guaranteed to generate interest. How else to explain the extraordinary following of millions of food blogs?

But would we have it any different?