Boba Beats the Competition, Cold Foods Remain Hot

Thank you to everyone who voted in our 10th annual Best New Frozen Retail Products Contest!

The nominees ranged from innovative product debuts to established brands and Boba Bam Instant Brown Sugar, an instant boba drink that goes from frozen to ready-to-drink in about a minute, was voted No. 1. In addition to a profile of Boba Bam, we sat down with company co-founders Bob Yau and Brian Khoddam, for an episode of From the Cold Corner podcast.

The rest of the top five pulled away from the pack of over a dozen nominated products in online voting during the month of May and are profiled in this issue:

No. 2: Brazi Bites Pizza Bites 

No. 3: Mona's Curryations Frozen Skillet Meals 

No. 4: Red Baron Fully Loaded Pizza 

No. 5: Alden's Organic Root Beer Float Bar

Get ready to vote in our next contest—Best New Refrigerated Retail Products—which will run through the month of August.

According to statistics presented at the American Frozen Food Institute (AFFI) AFFI-CON 2022, frozen food has been a pandemic powerhouse with growth already outpacing total food and beverages in the three years preceding the pandemic. You can read more about the state of the industry in our cover story.

It was also a pleasure to profile four women in leadership positions in the supply chain and logistics industry and I invite you to read their stories.

Dr. Sasha Goodman, president and fund manager at VegTech Invest, an investment firm specializing in plant-based foods and products, writes about the commodities outlook for plant-based proteins.

Our “hot city” for July is Denver, with a look at the Mile High City and its cold storage climate.

For the July Cold C-Suite Q&A, we sit down with Gail Becker, a mom who left a job in corporate America six years ago to start CAULIPOWER, a veggie-first frozen food brand that started with cauliflower-crust pizza.

And our tech showcase highlights refrigeration controls and equipment.