Hi there, and Happy New Year!

This week’s issue looks a little different. We’ve rounded up the most-read stories from FoodTech Weekly through 2025 based on your clicks. If you’re looking to catch up, these are the fun, thought-provoking, and essential stories you might have missed.

Oh, and if this (long) email ends abruptly, blame Gmail — click “View entire message” to keep reading.

THE TOP 50

Let’s do this

  1. Sjövett - the 1964 PSA ad from Swedish authorities encouraging people not to throw trash in the archipelago, and instead, well…

  1. Only one country in the world produces all the food it needs, study finds (Science Focus)

  2. FoodTech VC Steven Finn’s reflections on what went wrong at Meati

  3. GFI’s alt protein ecosystem map

  4. Solvable Syndicate on why you should always do double opt-in email intros

  5. The crops no one will ever buy (Offrange)

  6. The post-mortem advice to founders written by Andreas Karlsson after shutting down his FoodTech startup Veat

  7. The death of the corporate job (Alex McCann)

  8. “I am rich and have no idea what to do with my life” (Vinay Hiremath)

  9. Got Weird? Milk Is Headed for Its Strangest Year Yet. (New York Times)

  10. How Bread vs Rice Molded History (Thomas Pueyo)

  11. Spice up the weekly shop at Mallorca’s brutalist supermarket (Wallpaper)

  12. 🇪🇺 vs 🇺🇸:

Instagram post

  1. 🕯️In Loving Memory of Irina Gerry

  2. AI video interviewing people from the 1500s:

  1. 10 example videos from Google’s Veo 3, the “best AI video model in the world”.

  2. Anguilla’s .ai domain is now a digital goldmine, earning over $100 million in 2024

  3. A year in AgriFood – what I've learned (Harry Briggs - Astanor Ventures)

  4. Private chefs are spilling the culinary secrets of the super-rich (The Economist)

  5. FoodTech trends in 2025 (DigitalFoodLab)

  6. Scientists have achieved a remarkable breakthrough by creating glow-in-the-dark wood through a unique process involving fungi:

  1. The quest to make an ice cream that doesn't melt (BBC)

  2. These Large, Snake-Like Fish Are Invading the United States—and Authorities Want You to Kill Them (Smithsonian Magazine)

  3. The price of ‘sugar free’: are sweeteners as harmless as we thought? (The Guardian)

  4. Oatly’s spin-off company Aventure declared bankrupt: 'It has been a very challenging time' (Impact Loop)

  5. Cool video of Dyson’s new U.K. automated strawberry farm.

  6. 10 AgriFoodTech Battles of 2024: Hard Lessons Learned and Insights for the Industry (Forward Fooding)

  7. James Nares: Street

  1. 52 things I learned in 2025 (Tom Whitwell)

  2. The French city where you can eat gourmet food for €1 (BBC)

  3. The most disgusting British foods ever (BBC Good Food)

  4. ‘It really is possible to be zero waste’: the restaurant with no bin (The Guardian)

  5. Masters of Efficiency: The agricultural productivity of The Netherlands is INSANE (Adnan Oder)

  1. From a funding ‘ice age’ to keeping up with AI, what keeps startups awake at night as we head into 2026? (AgFunder News)

  2. Food Tech's Reality Check (Mike Lee)

  3. This RoboCake runs on chocolate-encased edible batteries (Reuters)

  1. Sweet protein co. joins forces with Ingredion & raises $18m to develop sugar reduction techniques (FoodNavigator)

  2. Swedish Midsummer for Dummies:

  1. Pluri acquires cultivated cocoa start-up Kokomodo (FoodBev Media)

  2. Fisherman catches 67-pound goldfish (CNN):

  1. Traffic rules in Germany:

  1. Building the next food system: Why we need food system transformation, and how tech/innovation is a key driver (Daniel Skavén Ruben / Solvable Syndicate)

  1. 2025 – the year that Silicon Valley and AgriFoodTech went from “It’s complicated” to “Hasta la vista” (Walt Duflock)

  2. Meet the members of the Dull Men’s Club: ‘Some of them would bore the ears off you’ (The Guardian)

  3. Diamond Edge Ventures Announces Strategic Investment in Food Packaging Startup, Freshr Sustainable Technologies

  4. nékojita fufu is an attachable mini robot that blows on hot drinks & food to cool them down (Designboom)

  1. How supermarket pricing strategies—particularly multi-buy promotions—contribute to excess food purchasing and lead to subsequent waste of food at home. (Sophie Attwood)

  2. The 50 Next Big Innovations in FoodTech, According to 20 VCs (HackSummit)

  3. Man posed as an ambassador and ran a fake embassy, Indian police say (AP News)

  4. Eight ways airlines exploit their own customers (Stay Grounded)

AND A BONUS 12 STORIES

Let’s wrap this up

  1. Erewhon’s ‘Dystopian’ $19 Strawberry Has the Internet Outraged (People)

  1. The foods that make you smell more attractive (BBC)

  2. Do You Even Know What Cinnamon Tastes Like? (Offrange)

  3. No, growing more food does not mean we always need more and more inputs (Hannah Ritchie)

  4. VC Math in Agrifood Tech: What It Takes to Return the Fund (Eshan Samaranayake / Better Bioeconomy)

  5. Trendlines Group and Bayer to Dissolve Agtech Fund

  6. EU unveils vision for sustainable agriculture and food sector by 2040 (FoodBev Media)

  7. How Microplastics Get into Our Food (Scientific American)

  8. Making a Wallace & Gromit contraption in real life:

  1. Bathtub Tiramisu? The Bizarre Dessert Trend Taking Over Instagram (Food & Wine)

  2. Greenhouses Are Having a Moment (Offrange)

  3. A High-Tech ‘Beer Printer’ From Belgium Wants to Digitize the Drinking Experience (Vinepair)

We love you.
Daniel & Ilkka

- - -

🎵 This issue was produced while listening to Paradise Circus by Massive Attack & Hope Sandoval.

THE LEFTOVERS

Written by Daniel Skavén Ruben and Ilkka Taponen.
Did someone forward this email to you? Subscribe here.

Disclosures | Boring disclaimer

Thank you for being a Premium subscriber! ❤️ It helps us cover the time and money we spend on producing FoodTech Weekly.

THE LEFTOVERS

Written by Daniel Skavén Ruben and Ilkka Taponen.
Did someone forward this email to you? Subscribe here.

Disclosures | Boring disclaimer

Become a Premium subscriber of FoodTech Weekly for just $5/mo. This helps us cover the time and money we spend on paid newsletters and databases to stay updated on the FoodTech ecosystem. And you’ll get rid of ads. Plus, we’ll send you a food-themed book that we love, once a year.

Keep Reading

No posts found

© 2026 FoodTech Weekly.

Report abuse

Privacy policy

Terms of use

Powered by beehiiv