It feels a little uncomfortable admitting it, but COVID-19 may actually yield a few upsides, or at least a few opportunities for snack and bakery brands to turn the pandemic's lemons into lemon-flavored blondie bites.

There was a time, not so long ago, when nutritional boundaries were more clear-cut. "Indulgent foods weren't healthy," says Mel Festejo, COO, American Key Food Products, Closter, NJ. "They either had a surfeit of nutrients that triggered health issues, or they contained ingredients whose names raised anxiety."

Snacks have to work pretty hard to keep up with consumer preferences these days. For one, they have to be suitably snackable, i.e., convenient and portable.

Cinco de Mayo fell on a Taco Tuesday this year. And while the coronavirus nixed any plans for celebrating the holiday en masse, it's a safe bet that families across the country did a fine job cooking up their own festivities at home, or ordering curbside takeout.

If it seems as though what's not in a product these days is as important as what is, you're not imagining things. The insistence on "clean" and "simple" ingredients that began with a fringe of vigilant label readers has pervaded the marketplace.

When a gluten-free version of Sheila G's Brownie Brittle hit U.S. stores in 2017, JoAnn Rupp, global market insights manager, Corbion, Lenexa, KS, noticed something that distinguished the product on an increasingly crowded gluten-free shelf.