Food Tech Assessment Task 2 - Written Component
a) Name the fruit or vegetable that you would preserve and outline the possible causes of deterioration and spoilage.
Food spoilage and deterioration results from a series of continuous disagreeable changes occurring in a food products original state, thereby affecting the products freshness, resulting in a reduction of its quality. These changes are detected by the senses of smell, taste, touch or sight. Foods, such as strawberries, can spoil or deteriorate through the means of physical damage, enzymic activity, microbial activity such as yeasts, bacteria, moulds and viruses, rodent infestation and the environmental factors surrounding food.
It is important to store food in correct conditions…show more content… Food is preserved to keep food safe and in an acceptable state for human consumption, and to keep food perishable year-round, providing a greater variety of food selection. Food products can be preserved using a variety of methods, such as freezing and canning/bottling.
Freezing is the storage of foods held between temperatures of -15 C and -30 C. Freezing inactivates enzymes and changes water to ice, preventing the spoilage and deterioration of food by inhibiting micro-organism growth. The low temperatures of freezing equipment inhibit the growth of micro-organisms and hinder enzymic and chemical activity. Ice crystals draw available water away from food products preventing this…show more content… The rate at which a food is frozen is critical to the quality of the food and can lead to the deterioration of the product. Post freezing, during the thawing stage (once removed from the freezer), micro-organism can recovery rapidly and begin multiplying in favourable conditions, therefore it is important foods are not exposed to these conditions. Methods of freezing have been developed within the food industry to speed-up the process, ensuring that products are frozen in the shortest time possible, thereby reducing the risk of micro-organism growth. New heating methods may include blast freezing, scraped heat exchange and cryogenic freezing.
Blast freezing: Where a product is subjected to a constant, steady stream of cold air in a tunnel or cabinet ranging from -40 C or lower.
Scraped heat exchange: Where products are frozen to reduce the formation of large ice crystals by being scraped against a cooled surface and immediately removed and scraped away.
Cryogenic freezing: Where liquid nitrogen, otherwise known as carbon dioxide, is sprayed directly onto small food items and freezing it almost instantly at temperatures of -196 C - -78