How I saw the banana trend coming

I never thought many Americans would drink green tea, for example. Oops.

But I appear to have gotten bananas right. Of course bananas aren’t a new thing. Blended with strawberries they’re the most popular smoothie flavor, they’re popular on sundaes, and they have long been the most widely consumed fresh fruit in the United States (although apples beat them out if you include juices, sauces, etc.).

But at our inaugural Future of Beverage conference in Austin, Texas, last year, I was asked on-stage what trends I saw for 2026, and I predicted bananas. This wasn’t based on data yet, but on interesting examples.

Mostly at chains I’d seen bananas where you’d expect them to be — bananas Foster pancakes at IHOP, banana cream pie ice cream at Bruster’s, assorted bananas in smoothies and açaí bowls all over the place — but sundaes were trending in independent restaurants, often with bananas, and I was struck by a cocktail made at an ambitious local restaurant, Terra, in my Brooklyn, New York, neighborhood of Sheepshead Bay, which is largely Russian and Ukrainian and not known for ambitious restaurants at all.

Boris Gerliani, the restaurant’s beverage director, who came up in Moscow’s bartending scene — a quite advanced scene, from what I can gather — made me what he called a Banana Boulevardier, created by adding an enzyme or something similar to bananas to break down the pectin so that, when strained over cheesecloth, it produces a very pronounced banana essence. It was both weird enough and mainstream enough that it triggered my trend-spotting instinct which inspired me to pipe up at the conference. Then last week I went to a cocktail-and-food pairing at Elcielo, an extremely trend-forward Colombian restaurant at Virgin Hotels in Midtown Manhattan, where consulting mixologist Brian Ipuz presented us with a cocktail called Micos Mojados, Spanish for “drunk monkeys,” made with brandy, rum, miso, bitters, and clarified banana crafted in a way quite similar to what Gerliani described.

It was garnished with crunchy freeze-dried banana. In between, bananas took off, especially in beverages, on chain menus across the country. According to our sister menu research company Technomic, banana limited-time offers have surged by 70% this year, which is a lot by any measure (Technomic’s Buzz Barometer calls it “Extra Hot,” its highest ranking) but certainly considering that the fruit already appears on 27%-28% of menus across the country.

Some of the fastest growing categories are surprising, such as blended into frozen teas or as an option in chopped salads. They’re also surging in coffee drinks, a custom that started in South Korea, where the government started pushing dairy consumption in the 1970s to improve public nutrition. To make it more palatable, companies began flavoring milk with banana.

It became a social-media phenomenon there in recent years when consumers filmed themselves adding banana milk to coffee in convenience stores, and it became a whole viral global thing. And this summer in particular, American coffeehouses responded.

Starbucks just introduced banana bread lattes and chais, and 7 Brew introduced a banana bread cold brew, which followed its Maui Mocha Frozen Chiller made with banana and coconut syrups. Technomic also ranks banana bread as an “extra hot” trend.

Sonic Drive-In just reintroduced its banana pudding shake as a limited-time offer as well as a Banana Pudding Blast — banana-pudding flavored soft serve blended with vanilla wafer cookie crumbles. It also has a new Banana Dirty Dr Pepper, which combines the soda with banana flavoring and cream, and a Banana Pudding Cream Slush that combines vanilla soft serve with banana flavor and ice. Other recent launches include a Chocolate Banana Protein Smoothie at Gong cha, a Banana Iced Latte at Mandy’s Salades Gourmandes, and more typical options such as banana caramel butter cake at North Italia and a bite-sized banana-Nutella Bundtlet at Nothing Bundt Cakes.

Of course, all of this makes sense. Many of the most successful trends are based on something everyone already likes modified into something a little bit different.

And what’s more likable than a banana? I’m not sure what I’m going to predict for 2027, but maybe you should swing by our next Future of Beverage conference this year and find out. It’s Nov. 10-12 in Dallas, and because my bosses would be irritated if I didn’t include a link for you to register, here it is.