Tag Archives: Food

Food

Working As a Food Engineer

Food engineers perform a wide variety of jobs, and these jobs are incredibly important in terms of food safety and quality. Students who wish to become food engineers often complete a bachelor’s degree in agriculture or food science before entering the field. They must learn the rules of safety, preparation and storage, and the chemical processes that result in the creation of new products. Since these jobs are so important to the health and welfare of the general population, food engineers actually play a much more important role than many people believe. They tend to work for companies such as Frito Lay, Nabisco, Tyson, and other large processing companies to ensure that the food put on the market is of high quality and is safe to consume.

Other engineering jobs for food engineers involves working for agencies such as the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) or the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA). These regulatory agencies provide jobs in engineering to professionals who can help them monitor the quality of new products and to make sure that farmers and other agriculturalists are following food safety measures. Other engineering jobs may be offered to individuals looking to create new products such as pharmaceuticals or supplements.

Another popular area for jobs in engineering for food safety specialists involves creating new storage equipment that will help maintain high-quality products for longer periods of time. These individuals may work with companies like Walmart or other food distributors to consult on new methods for food preservation and quality control. They may also conduct research on certain foods to see what the ideal storage conditions are for these items and design plans for implementing these conditions in the stores.

Working as a food engineer requires several important skills, including organization, attention to detail, creativity, and excellent analytical skills. Food engineers may have to create reports about food safety precautions, regulatory measures, or reviews of restaurants and their food safety hazards. Therefore, strong writing skills are also an advantage in this field.

Food

Beware Of “Healthy” Food Labelling

We’re in a time and age where fast food has become the order of the day, leading to many undesired health effects such as obesity, hypertension, heart diseases, etc. In the process, a lot of individuals have developed a craze to eat healthy. But whilst in this mix and rush of healthy eating, some, if not most, of the people have become deceived when choosing their foods. This deception has come mainly through reading the food labelling and ingredients panel incorrectly or from a misinformed position.

You need to be aware of a couple of key things when reading food nutrition facts and the ingredients panel. The first thing is the order in which the ingredients are put. Usually the ingredient that is present in the highest amounts is the first to be listed. In other words, if a loaf of bread is labelled 100% whole wheat, when you go to the ingredients panel, whole wheat should be the first or at least one of the first ingredients. If it’s nowhere near the top then that “100% whole wheat” labelling was just a phoney. So looking at the ingredients panel at the back will help to show you just what exactly is in the food you’re about to choose. So just because something is labelled to be healthy or to contain something healthy doesn’t necessarily mean that it is healthy or contains that particular claim.

Another thing to be aware of when looking at the ingredients list is isolating certain or a single ingredient and thereby labelling the food as “healthy”. The presence of just one healthy ingredient does not make the food healthy. Other factors come into play also. For one, how much of this “healthy ingredient” is present in the food in the first place? For all you know it could just be 5% of all the ingredients! Also what else is in the food?

And present in what amounts? These questions lead us to the next thing that you need to be aware of; the nutrition facts panel.

It’s important that you not just take a look at but also understand the nutrition facts of your chosen food. This will help you to know just what nutritional value, if any, that you’ll get from that food or beverage. Nutrition facts not only show you the calories that the particular food or beverage has but also the amounts of the other nutrients, minerals and vitamins contained in the food. Pay particular attention to things such as total fat, cholesterol, trans fat, sodium and sugar contents. Too much of these can lead to adverse health effects. So don’t be fooled if a particular food is said to be a great source of dietary fiber and when you look at the nutrition facts, the amount of sodium is more that 50% of your daily recommended value. In fact, what’s just important is that you look at the nutrition facts and ingredients panel and weigh out the benefits and disadvantages you’ll get from that particular food or beverage.

Final recap: Check out the ingredients list of the food or beverage that you want to have. The top ingredient is the one that is present in the highest amounts. Also remember to check out the nutrition facts panel of that food or beverage. Watch out for things that may bring about problems for your health. Secondly, do not isolate a certain “healthy” ingredient you’ve seen on the ingredients panel and declare that particular food to be healthy. Read through all the ingredients and don’t forget what we’ve just mentioned: the nutrition facts panel. And finally, beware of certain healthy foods which have substances added to them that may instantly make them, well, not so healthy. An example of this is yogurt. Yogurt is a great healthy snack. However, you need to watch out for yogurts that are labelled “sweetened”. This means that they have more sugar added to them. Sugar by itself is not bad, but too much sugar may be problematic to your health in the long run.