ST. FRANCIS, WIS. — Wixon has developed a range of Mexican Comfort Food Flavors.

The company’s applications innovation team studied the culinary influences in different regional Mexican specialties, including birria, a slow-cooked, warm-spicy meat stew that is served as a taco filling or as a casserole.

“The birria trend we are seeing sweep the United States is a take on Tijuana-style birria de res, made from beef,” said Becca Henrickson, marketing manager at Wixon. “It’s an adobo-marinated beef blend, stewed and chopped into pieces, and placed in a tortilla that was dipped in beef fat and warmed on a griddle.”

Birria became popular in Tijuana, Mexico, in the early 2000s and was introduced to the Los Angeles market in 2013, she said. Interest has bubbled up across the United States, with Yelp identifying it as one of the top food trends to try in 2021.

The birria flavor lends itself to other applications, Ms. Henrickson said. Wixon recreated the taste as a flavoring for snacks, sauces and marinades. Other flavor systems in the Mexican Comfort Food range include salted caramel tres leches, creamy habanero manchego type, vegan Guerrero-style pozole, mango tajin type, guajillo lime carnitas, smoky mezcal type, za’atar elote and manchamanteles mole.