Food Processing: A Survival Methodology
Food Alchemist Reflections #3. Past, present and future of food processing
In a world that has been built by words and words that have been created by humans, where does nature take the lead? It is time for a change, re-think what has been already established by our words, and create a new paradigm that includes us as part of nature. How? Through Food. Food is our common treasure, the best indicator of our planet’s health. These words represent an out-loud thought from The Food Alchemist Lab that endeavors to take you on a trip around general and specific food topics → proposing solutions, destroying myths, and waking up your interest through impactful recipes. Because your curiosity is our trigger and, once you’ve shot us, nothing will stop us from bringing a better food system, the one that listens to nature’s voice.
1. First things first
The food environment is continuously changing and humans must adapt to the modifications to survive. Two million years ago, climate change occurred in the world making the land drier. Thus, pre-Homo sapiens developed cooperative and social behavior to hunt animals. This environmental adaptation had consequences in our metabolism due to the higher availability of proteins, polyunsaturated fatty acids, and minerals. Hence, this change made the pre-human brain larger and more complex and brought the species closer to what it is today. This evolutionary adaptation generated other needs such as to make better use of hunted foods. That’s what led to the discovery of fire, the desire to improve food security, food digestibility, and nutrient bioavailability. Finally, 300.000 years ago, Homo sapiens began their life in history (James et al., 2019).
Today, food industrialization, food production, new jobs, and sedentarism are cooking up a not-so-promising future. In the past, Homo sapiens had the survival advantage over all the other Homo species due to a group of genes called “Thrifty” or FTO genes. However, these genes are those which are now related to obesity and diabetes due to the current food and lifestyle landscape in developed countries. Because of that, the current food environment is the reason why an advantage has become a disadvantage. History shows that humans have been highly involved in climate shaping, and food production is one of the most important reasons for this.
For example, the sugar industry produced 165.5 million tons of sugar in 2020 which equates to 58.89 grams of sugar per person per day (WHO sugar intake recommendation is a maximum of 50 grams of added sugar/person/day). Furthermore, this sugar is mostly used as an ingredient for ultra-processed foods and beverages, representing the most prevalent food category sources of added sugar in the US (USDA, 2017).
Additionally, the sugar industry also affects the environment: 0.45 to 0.63 kg of CO2 is emitted per kg of sugar, while 0.192 kg of CO2 is produced per km of car travel (García et al., 2016). Thus, food processing has made us evolve into what we are now, in turn, it is damaging us. But, what exactly is processing food? What are the different kinds of processes and how do they modify the food characteristics?
2. From picking to turning on.
When we hear the word process, we start to think about machines and factories. However, when we cut, boil, fry, or salt, we are processing foods. We should not be afraid of this word and we should understand what is behind each procedure and why we have been doing it. This article will present different ways of processing that have helped and/or are helping us to survive.
Microorganism action
Fermentation is one of our fetishes in the Food Alchemist Lab and one of the first techniques that humans developed to preserve food for longer and to improve the nutritional characteristics without using fire. For example, sourdough, made from a fermentation starter of water and flour, bread is easier to digest, richer in B vitamins, and has a better taste, aroma, and texture. Furthermore, if we think about why we began drinking alcohol since it is harmful to us, we will know we did it to ensure our water sources were safe from spoilage. Eventually, our livers evolved to produce the enzyme alcohol dehydrogenase (ADH). Additionally, we have cured meats, pickled vegetables, and fermented dairy products, created to have the possibility of eating meat, some veggies, or dairy products throughout the year instead of just during their season. Digestibility, shelf-life, micronutrient bioavailability (mainly B vitamins), and sometimes protein biological value (for example in tempeh and miso paste) increase thanks to microorganism metabolism. Also, they are usually full of microorganisms, as was commented in the last Medium article, which helps our health. The symbiotic relationship between these non-visible organisms and us helped both survive and evolve, but sometimes we try to avoid them. Let’s look at how!
Smoke action
When fire came into our lives, apart from cooking, humans began to smoke foods in different ways: cold (15–25 ºC, ex. fish and raw ham), warm (25–40 ºC ex. raw processed meat), or hot (55–80 ºC, ex. cooked ham and frankfurters) smoking. The region, food culture, and food matrix all influence the smoking process selection. For example, hot smoking, typical of middle-south European countries, is faster, modifies more texture, and smokes the fatty parts more than the lean parts of foods (Maga, 2018).
The primary purpose of smoking was to improve food shelf-lives, but why? Smoke molecules are highly toxic for microorganisms, allowing us to sterilize food without salting or heating. Besides, it adds complexity to the flavor and aroma. Smoking processes also improve the protein digestibility of foods as smoke components can serve as enzyme activators. However, these compounds are also toxic to us. Smoked compounds, generated at high temperatures in the smoking matrix (charcoal, wood, etc), such as polycyclic aromatic compound (PAH), nitrosamines, or advanced glycation end products (AGEs) are oxidant compounds related to non-communicable chronic diseases such as cancer, cardiovascular diseases, and inflammatory diseases. Thus, we shouldn’t eat them often, but this way of processing has been used for thousands of years and helped us conserve protein-based foods longer. Thanks to the temperature, we can smoke, but do we know why we heat foods? (Maga, 2018).
Temperature action
Normally, pathogen microorganisms are not able to live in higher temperatures (> 50 ºC). How long can a human survive at 60–70 ºC? Not more than a few hours. That’s one of the reasons we started to use fire to sterilize foods. However, there is another reason that could be even more important: digestibility. If humans could digest better with higher nutrient availability, they would improve the likelihood of survival. But, how can temperature modify nutrient digestibility? Proteins are complex molecules, difficult to digest, but temperature denaturalizes them, meaning it changes their tridimensional shape. That means that our digestive enzymes can digest them more easily, and we can absorb them more efficiently. Similar action happens with starches, thanks to temperature, they break, which is why grains, fruit, and vegetables become sweeter after cooking. Finally, many vitamins and minerals bonded to other molecules avoid absorption, get separated, and become available for us. Stomachs bless temperature! But, thanks to scientific progress, we can also obtain similar results with pressure… Have you ever asked yourself why a pressure cooker is useful?
Pressure action
We have to remember the Gay-Lussac Law in which P1 / T1= P2 / T2. This formula explains that reaching a higher pressure has the same effect as augmenting the temperature because the pressure and temperature of a gas in a constant volume are directly proportional. This is why chickpeas can be cooked in half the time with a pressure cooker than in a regular pot.
Food technology has greatly improved the capacity to augment the pressure in different cooking and industrial tools. Nowadays, an innovative industrial methodology exists called High Pressure-Low Temperature (HPLT), through which proteins become denaturalized, starches are broken down, and vitamins are separated from anti-nutrients without reaching temperatures higher than 30 ºC. This procedure yields better results in sensorial and nutritional characteristics compared to other procedures such as sterilization or UHT, used to process many of the products we buy every day (tomato sauce, milk, canned tuna, etc.). A present-day innovation used more and more to develop foods in a better way (Urrutia et al., 2004).
3. In-a-nutshell recipe
Microorganisms, smoke, temperature, and pressure are some of the food processing drivers that have helped us survive. Humans have evolved to this day thanks to modifying food characteristics to better digest foods in a safer way. Furthermore, our genetics have adapted to metabolize some potentially harmful compounds (alcohol, furanes, nitrosamines, etc.). Currently, we need to choose healthier procedures if we want to survive because we are overfed and highly exposed to unhealthy processed foods. That’s why José de la Rosa will show you a recipe in which he will gather different food processings into a savory “torrija” with “tatemada” sauce, smoked napolitan eggplants and kefir-koji cheese. It’s time to use your hands!
4. References
- García, C. A., García-Treviño, E. S., Aguilar-Rivera, N., & Armendáriz, C. (2016). Carbon footprint of sugar production in Mexico. Journal of Cleaner Production, 112, 2632–2641. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2015.09.113
- James, W. P. T., Johnson, R. J., Speakman, J. R., Wallace, D. C., Frühbeck, G., Iversen, P. O., & Stover, P. J. (2019). Nutrition and its role in human evolution. Journal of Internal Medicine. Blackwell Publishing Ltd. https://doi.org/10.1111/joim.12878
- Maga, J. A. (2018). Smoke in Food Processing. Smoke in Food Processing. CRC Press. https://doi.org/10.1201/9781351076647
- Urrutia Benet, G., Schlüter, O., & Knorr, D. (2004). High pressure-low temperature processing. Suggested definitions and terminology. Innovative Food Science and Emerging Technologies, 5(4), 413–427. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ifset.2004.06.001
- USDA. (2017). Sugar: World Markets and Trade. Usda, 1–8. Retrieved from https://www.fas.usda.gov/data/sugar-world-markets-and-trade
The Future Food Institute is an international social enterprise that believes climate change is at the end of your fork. By harnessing the power of its global ecosystem of partners, innovators, researchers, educators, and entrepreneurs, FFI aims to sustainably improve life on Earth through transformation of global food systems.
By training the next generation of changemakers, empowering communities, and engaging government and industry in actionable innovation, FFI catalyzes progress towards achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
Learn more at www.futurefoodinsitute.org, join the conversation on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, or YouTube. Or attend a program through the FutureFood.Academy!
