The Foundations of Food Technology

Edmund W. Schuster
Sep 3, 2018 · 4 min read
In this photo taken in the 1920s, Samuel Cate Prescott, left, and William Lyman Underwood discuss their canning research. Image courtesy of the MIT Museum For more information see: Canned Good.

Most overlook the deep influence that historical innovations in food technology had on American society. And yet the pace of innovation has slowed in this basic area that helps all.

For example, many overlook that the first application of statistical quality control (SQC) was in the American food industry, specifically the canning process for fruits, vegetables, fish, and meats. This was during the 1940s or 1950s, about the time that Demming and Juran began to work with Japanese manufacturers in the SQC area after first being rejected by American industrialists. It took at least three decades for this mathematical approach to diffuse into manufacturing on a widespread basis starting in the 1980s.

Below is a brief chronology of some of the major advancements in food technology:

In 1806, Nicolas Appert was the first to preserve a wide range of foods by heating them in sealed glass jars. About 50 years hence, Louis Pasteur made huge contributions to public health by discovering ways to use heat to eliminate bacteria that cause disease from basic food products such as milk.

In the United States, Samuel Cate Prescott, a long-time professor at MIT from 1896 to 1942, optimized the retort processing for the food canning industry. He worked with William Lyman Underwood, the owner of a food company set up in Boston in 1822 to reduce the incidence of thermal failure in canning, a 72 years-long problem for the company.

On the West Coast of America, William V. Cruess, a professor at UC Berkeley and later UC Davis during 1911 to 1954, put forth the basics of food preservation by freezing. He deeply influenced the food and agricultural industry, making California a leader in fruit and vegetable production.

In 1957, C.O. Ball and F.C.W. Olson, of Rutgers University and the University of Florida respectively, published their classic book on the sterilization of foods using heat. The piece is a comprehensive mathematical treatment and includes a deep assessment of the literature.

In all these cases, the basic advances in food technology had a wide effect on American society by reducing the outbreak of food borne illness, improving supply, and reducing retail prices. The transformation of the supply chain was especially profound in areas like refrigerated foods and the building of national brands.

A substantial portion of current research in food technology focuses on process engineering and optimization, and the improvement of product attributes. The amount of resources devoted to fundamental research has dwindled in recent years as packaged foods undergo intense competition from prepared foods sold in supermarkets along with the natural appeal of fresh foods. The entire industry is moving away from national brands.

The drivers of future innovation will come from the entrepreneurial and venture capital communities as startups take risks in developing new food technologies. This is a refreshing change from the philosophy of incremental advances advocated by the national brands. Traditional departments at research universities such as chemical, biological, and mechanical engineering (and chemistry, biology, and physics) will play a much larger role as compared to the current focal point of research located in food technology departments and Schools of Agriculture. However, in any case it is extremely hard to predict the innovations that will catch on with consumers and the origin of new thinking and new technologies.

Two historical examples are worth noting in this regard. Arguably the first branded food product in the United States was Welch’s grape juice (1869), developed by Thomas Bramwell Welch, a dentist from New Jersey. He had read about the work of Pasteur and applied the scientific findings to the preservation of fruit juice. His initial goal was to provide “non-fermented wine” for Communion during the Sunday church service for his Methodist congregation. The idea caught on and became an early food item distributed at country-wide scale though small stands at county fairs.

A second example was the early foundation of the processed meat business when Sam Stein of Cleveland, Ohio began through trial and error to produce preformed meat patties during the early 1950’s. His idea created a standardized product that saved time and became quite popular with the rise of food vending in America.

In both examples, entrepreneurs used the knowledge at hand to build a business that filled an essential need. They created entire new industries in the food segment. This is the healthy sign of innovation, which until recently has been lacking in the American food industry.

Edmund W. Schuster

Dedicated to the best in analysis and insight — schuster.us.com.

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