FOOD PROCESSING
Transcript: FOOD PROCESSING What is food processing What is Food Processing Definition Food processing is the transformation of agricultural products into food, or of one form of food into other forms. Food processing includes many forms of processing foods, from grinding grain to make raw flour to home cooking to complex industrial methods used to make convenience foods. Primary food processing is necessary to make most foods edible, and secondary food processing turns the ingredients into familiar foods, such as bread. Tertiary food processing has been criticized for promoting over nutrition and obesity, containing too much sugar and salt, too little fiber, and otherwise being unhealthful. History History Food processing dates back to the prehistoric ages when crude processing incorporated fermenting, sun drying, preserving with salt, and various types of cooking (such as roasting, smoking, steaming, and oven baking), Such basic food processing involved chemical enzymatic changes to the basic structure of food in its natural form, as well served to build a barrier against surface microbial activity that caused rapid decay. Salt-preservation was especially common for foods that constituted warrior and sailors' diets until the introduction of canning methods. Evidence for the existence of these methods can be found in the writings of the ancient Greek, Chaldean, Egyptian and Roman civilizations as well as archaeological evidence from Europe, North and South America and Asia. These tried and tested processing techniques remained essentially the same until the advent of the industrial revolution. Examples of ready-meals also date back to before the preindustrial revolution, and include dishes such as Cornish pasty and Haggis. Both during ancient times and today in modern society these are considered processed foods. History of Food Processing Benefits and Preservation Common Methods Of Processing And Preserving Food Food processing is a way or technique implemented to convert raw food stuff into well-cooked and well preserved eatables for both the humans and the animals. All these methods are used by food processing industry to give out processed or preserved foods for our daily consumption. Best quality harvested, slaughtered and butchered and clean constituents are used by food processing industry to manufacture very nutritious and easy to cook food products. Following are some techniques and methods used to convert food into processed or preserved food. Preservation process: this includes heating or boiling to destroy micro-organisms, oxidation, toxic inhibition, dehydration or drying, osmotic inhibition, freezing, a sort of cold pasteurization which destroys pathogens and various combinations of all these methods. Drying Drying: this is probably the most ancient method used by humans to preserve or process their food. Drying reduces the water content in the product and lack of water delays the bacterial growth very much. Drying is the most common technique to preserve or process cereal grains like wheat, maize, oats, rice, barley, grams and rye etc. Smoking Smoking: many foods such as meat, fish and others are processed, preserved and flavored by the use of smoke mostly in big smoke houses. This process is very simple as the combination of smoke to preserved food without actually cooking it and the aroma of hydro-carbons generated from the smoke processes the food and makes it even tastier to eat. Freezing Freezing: probably, it is the most common technique used in modern world to preserve or process the food both on commercial and domestic basis. This freezing is conducted in big cold storages which can stockpile huge amount of food stuffs which can be further used in some natural emergencies. A very big range of products can be frozen to preserve and process which includes some which do not need freezing when are in their natural condition. For example potato chips and potato wafers requires freezing whereas a potato does not. Vacuum Pack Vacuum packs: in this method, food is packed in airtight bags and bottles in a vacuum area. This method is used in processing the food as the air-tight environment doesn’t provide oxygen needed by germs especially bacteria to survive. This then, prevents food from getting rotted. This method is very commonly used for preserving processed nuts. Salting: the method of salting is used in food processing as it sucks out the moisture from the food. This is done through the process of osmosis. Meat is the best example of the food processed by salting as nitrates are used very frequently to treat meat. Salting Sugaring: the method of using sugar to preserve or process food is very frequent where it comes to preserve fruits. In this method fruits such as apples, peaches and plums are cooked with sugar until they are crystallized and then it is stored dry. Now days, sugar is also used in combination of alcohol to make some branded alcohol and spirits. Sugaring Pickling: in this method of