Food Industry and Food Technology

Good food products start with a person who will pay, not with a recipe you like. In this module you look at what buyers already purchase and where they are unhappy. You finish with one named buyer and a product idea that fits a real gap.

• List 10 products on sale near you and write the price per kilo and the kind of buyer for each one.
• Look for gaps in taste, diet, pack size, freshness or price, because a gap is a reason for a buyer to switch.
• Ask five buyers what they buy, how often they buy it and what annoys them, and write the answers down word for word.
• Name one buyer who has said they would try a sample, since a named buyer is worth more than a guess about a crowd.
• A common mistake is to ask friends, who will say they like everything, so ask people who pay for the product today.

Activity. Complete a market table of 10 products and five buyer notes, then write one sentence naming your product and your first buyer.

Standard to meet. Price ten products per kilo, hear five buyers, and name one buyer with a weekly quantity.

A hazard plan is a short list of what can go wrong at each step and what stops it. It is the main tool that keeps food safe for the people who eat it. You learn to draw your own process and test each step with the same questions.

• Draw your process as boxes from buying to selling, and ask at each box what can go wrong.
• Sort each hazard into one of four types: germs, chemical, foreign bodies and allergens.
• Mark the control points where a step makes food safe, such as cooking, cooling, cold storage, cleaning and hand washing.
• Set a limit for each control point, keep a daily log and write what you do when a limit fails.
• A common mistake is to write a plan once and never use it, so the log must be filled in on every production day.

Activity. Draw the flow of your product and mark every hazard, control, limit and corrective action on it.

Standard to meet. Give every step a hazard question and a control, list allergens, and give each limit a number and an action if it fails.

A home recipe is not a production recipe, because production needs exact weights and a repeatable method. You will weigh everything, change one thing at a time and record what you get. The result is a final recipe you can scale with confidence.

• Write every ingredient in grams, not cups or spoons, because volume changes with packing and humidity.
• Remember that salt, spice, raising agent and bake time do not scale in a straight line, so test each larger batch.
• Calculate yield as weight out divided by weight in, times 100, and write it on every batch record.
• Change only one thing between trial batches so you know what caused each difference.
• A common mistake is to scale the recipe by eye, so always weigh the dough before and the biscuits after baking.

Activity. Build three trial batches, changing one thing in each, and record weight in, weight out and yield.

Standard to meet. Complete three batch records with yield and write a final recipe with a reason for each change.

Shelf life is what you can prove, not what you hope. In this module you keep samples in the pack you will sell and check them on set days. You then set a date label that is shorter than the tested life.

• Pack samples in the final pack and store them at the temperature the buyer will use.
• Check smell, look, texture and taste on days 1, 3, 7, 10 and 14, and record each result.
• Take the last day with no fault as the tested life.
• Set the label date shorter than the tested life to leave a safety margin, for example 70% of the tested life.
• A common mistake is to test in an open tub, so test only in the sold pack.

Activity. Run a shelf-life test with samples and set the label date from your records.

Standard to meet. Record five dated sample records, and show that the label date is shorter than the tested life with a margin.

A label is both a legal paper and a sales tool. It must give true information in a clear order. You draft the label and have an expert check it before you print.

• Show name, ingredients in order of weight, allergens in bold, net weight, batch code, date and your contact, and ask your local food authority whether a nutrition table and which date wording (best before or use by) apply to your product.
• Fill packs to at least the net weight on the label and check with a scale.
• Print no health claims, because they can be false or illegal and cannot be proven by a small trial.
• Ask your local food authority to check the draft label before printing a large number.
• A common mistake is to print the label before checking the rules, so keep the first print small.

Activity. Draft the label, weigh five packs and get one expert comment.

Standard to meet. Check that all items are present, allergens are highlighted, no claims are made, and all five packs are at or above net weight.

You must know the cost of one unit before you set a price. Many small makers forget labour, energy or waste and then lose money without noticing. In this module you build a cost sheet with a currency on every line.

• Cost per unit = total cost divided by units made and sold.
• Margin = (price - cost) divided by price, shown as a percentage.
• Include ingredients, packs, energy, kitchen share, labour and waste on the sheet.
• Ask your mentor to check the sheet for a missing cost, and calculate the margin twice.
• A common mistake is to treat your own time as free, which makes the price too low to continue.

Activity. Build a cost sheet for one batch with the currency on every line and a price decision.

Standard to meet. Calculate the margin twice with the same result, so that the mentor finds no missing cost.

The trial is small, real and recorded. You sell to a real buyer for 30 days and keep a daily log so that every decision can be checked later. You also answer every complaint with a change.

• Log date, batch, units made, units sold, waste and complaints every production day.
• Keep one sample of every batch until its date has passed.
• Answer each complaint within a day and write the change you made.
• Check core temperature or another control point on every batch, not only on some.
• A common mistake is to fix problems without writing them down, so record the cause as well as the fix.

Activity. Run 30 days and keep the log, then write a one-page summary of what you changed.

Standard to meet. Record 30 days of results, and answer every complaint with a dated change.

At the end of the trial you compare the plan with what happened and decide what to do next. A decision backed by numbers is easier to explain to a buyer, a mentor or a lender. You also give feedback to peers.

• Make a before and after table of waste, cost per unit, returns and buyer count.
• Write three lessons in plain words, each with a number as evidence.
• Decide to scale, change or stop, and write the reason.
• Present to a review room and give two peers written feedback.
• A common mistake is to decide on a feeling, so every choice must point to a figure in the table.

Activity. Present to a review room and give two peers written feedback.

Standard to meet. Support the decision with at least three numbers from the trial.