RL 141013-141027 Domain 3: Ideation

Image courtesy of Forbes.com

I'm sure countless of ideas came across our mind day in and out, but how many of us really turn those ideas into reality? The infographic above shows how these big household names all originated from a simple idea that all of us might be able to think of. Since getting an idea is nothing so hard, why is it so difficult for us to realise them?

Lesson 3- "Big things start small."

We're now in week 9, 6 weeks more until the end of this semester. What we have done so far was collecting data, analysing data, then collecting and analysing data again. I knew some of our classmates started to feel this process to be a bit too dreadful. We had only 1.5 semester (20 weeks) before the launching of our final product, and yet we haven't had the faintest idea of what product are we making. Some of them were already losing their nerves, some others were so ambitious that they jump a step ahead even before we got a conclusion from our previous studies. Our group so far seemed to be the chillest of all, because we know, "big things start small'.    

Yes, why so panic, when we would reach this step anyway? So, a brief recap of what we have done so far, we did a more general market survey to know the food preference, eating habit, etc of the general public, then moved on to a more specific consumer study to understand what exactly the children wants. From there, we came to a conclusion that the food we produce should:

1. be small portion, and convenient;

2. be carbohydrate based;

3. contain processed meat or hidden vegetables

4. be something the children preferred or are familiar with.

Making use of these information we collected, now it's the time for us to let our imaginations run wild, we finally started working on our final product! Not so fast, haha, we haven't decided our product yet. So, we started with coming up ideas for the product. How? by ideation! 

Source: Hadjisofocli, D.C., 2014. Ideation

So yeah, ideation sounds fancy, but it's actually a very practical tool/approach for creating ideas. Simply put, it's putting ideas into action. As I mentioned in the beginning, everyone has ideas, but what makes some ideas work, while others remain as a fantasy? Many people would say: "Oh, because some people are copy cats, they just copy ideas from other people, of course it can't work". But I don't buy this, 'cause I believe that nothing is original. So, how do we convince people so they buy your ideas?

Okay, before I get to that, let's first talk about the ways of creating ideas. I did a simple google search on the keyword "ideation technique", 401,000 results were found in 0.38s. There are plenty of methods to come out with ideas, but the most common and convenient way is to carry out brainstorming. Two heads are always better than one, no? 

Even if there are conflicting ideas. A little conflict is always welcome to spice up the group dynamic... ;) 

Yes, our group also brainstormed to come out with our ideas, and it did get a little heated at times like the picture up there. However, the whole session was always guided by the criteria of the food we set in the beginning, so we didn't really get off track. In addition to that, we also used white boarding to facilitate the brainstorming session. We threw our ideas on the whiteboard so everyone could see and so we do not forget and missed out the ideas. Then, we fine tuned all the ideas and organised them into 10 ideas, which we named them alpha-concepts..

Our scribbles on the white board...

So, back to the question just now, what makes some ideas 'greater' than the others, and why some ideas are able to realise while others remain as fantasy? It all goes to one word-- documentation. Ngawww, not again... *groans* Isn't ideation all about being fun and innovative, why are we back to the boring stuff?? Nope, nope, if you're thinking like that, you're getting yourself a big trouble. You think you can immediately come out with ideas when you need them? The human brain is not a robot, they can't store every single information, especially those that are not frequently used. So, putting ideas into papers (be it the literal paper or its electronic counterpart) is a great way to keep track of all the ideas. Now you have your ideas recorded, innit more convenient for you when you wanna refer back?

However, there are also skills in recording down this idea, it's not just about merely jotting down the ideas somewhere. It's the best for you to set up a system to record all these ideas. How? by using a template. A template gives you a guideline on what should be recorded down. Other than the concepts and specification, it is very important to jot down the date and the team involved. This is to back you up in case one day someone has a similar idea as yours, you can prove that this is not a plagiarised work, simply by the date and all these scripts. Of course, it is also essential to justify the concepts so that people understand your point of view and your reasons of coming up with this idea even if it may sound silly. Do not get defeated when people do not agree with you. Have faith in yourself, 'cause after all, what doesn't kill you makes you stronger. 

So, you get it now why those big companies can succeed with just a simple idea? They dare to dream big, and believe in them, and most importantly, they put those ideas into action. That's what matters most. 

That's basically what I have to say for today. To end the post, I shall present you the 10 alpha-concepts our group created. Hope you like it, and please do not hesitate to give me some feedback!

Beet root burger with spicy honey sauce sandwiched in carrot bun.

Brown rice crisps quiche

Crispy spring roll

Chick pea pie

Vegetable chips

Pizza roll

Brown glutinous rice ball

Sweet potato roti canai

Traffic light nuggets

Waffle kebab

Is all,
Dong
  

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RL 20140915-20141013 Domain 2: Consumer study

Phew, was this a long and dreadful domain. With the long weekend in the middle interrupting our schedule, it made me felt like this domain took me forever to complete. So, you ask what did we do after the market study? Well, we followed up with a more comprehensive study, that is, consumer study. 

Lesson 2: Sometimes we are so focused on what we want that we miss the things we need.

Okay, so what's consumer study? Basically, it's part of the market research, but a more in depth study on consumer's behaviour. Remember what we did on market study? We collected general information on what the market is like, such as demography and purchasing behaviour. After knowing the big picture, it's time to zoom in and focus on smaller parts and details of the picture, hence consumer studies. 

Why consumer studies? Well, many studies found that consumers voice are often more powerful than advertising, as the industry paradigm is shifting from product-oriented to consumer-oriented. Why? because consumers are the source of revenue, providing what they need is much easier than convincing them that they need this. 

How did we conduct this study? Typical method was to conduct a survey using questionnaire. However, the method has some drawbacks such as fluctuation of consumer's emotion that the researcher could not detect, and also limited and general answers collected. Hence, we conducted a focus group, which allows the researcher to interact with the respondents so that they can capture instantaneous feeling of the consumers. In addition, kids were less articulate in written language, so having a group of kids talking to each other can trigger more responses from them. 

After the focus group.. Photo courtesy of Kenley 

And so, we went back to SK Subang Jaya to conduct a focus group, asking the children on their eating and purchasing pattern in the school and their perspective on food. The session lasted for roughly 1.5 hours where we voice and tape recorded. And then came the most brain racking part of the domain, which is interpreting what the students say. =O We had to listen to the focus group over and over again and record all the responses before filtering out the unimportant information. To add salt to the wound, many instances we were indecisive as to include what they say because:

Anyway, after hours of listening to the recordings, we finally managed to compile the information into two mind maps, which you can assess from here and here. 

To summarise our findings:

1. The children have the awareness for healthy food but it seems to them as something not important, thus they prefer junk food over so-called healthy food such as vegetables.

2. They do not eat until full as recess time (eating with friends) is considered as a time to socialise.

3. They refer food as energy more than nutrients. 

4. They don't mind eating vegetables as long as they didn't realise.

5. Mother figure is a symbol for healthy and wholesome food. 

6. Although some of the has lactose intolerance, they generally like dairy products. 

7. Pizza, burgers, fast food and bakery products are among the food that they prefer most. 

8. They are willing to spend a maximum of RM3 for their food during recess. 

9. They usually buy their meals and a drink. 

From the findings, we concluded that our product should have the following features:

1. Contains meat product that has hidden vegetables. 

2. Completed with a healthy drink

3. Able to provide high energy

4. Costs at around RM1.

After coming to this conclusion, it's time for us to brainstorm and come out with our first draft of our products. So stay tune for the next post, as I shall update on the 10 concepts we come out with. =D

That's all folks! 

Dong

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RL 140824-140915 Domain 1: Market study

If you still remember, in the last post I was talking about childhood obesity in Malaysia and how it relates to our FYP. That was only part of the agenda for my first food product development lecture. Guess what else did we do on that day? Haha, yeah, we started on the project right away. No time for us to fool around, yes, it's time for work. >.<

Lesson 1: "If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles." Sun Tzu, The Art of War

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First step of our product development was market study, and the purpose of market study is pretty much summed up by Sun Tzu in one sentence, "knowing your enemy so you fear not of failure". Turning into the context of our project, the consumers are like our enemy, in order for our product to succeed, we need to know what them well-- who are they, what they want, how they behave, why they behave certain ways, etc.

To get the answers to all these questions, we decided to set a questionnaire, collecting responses from school kids and parents with children in primary school. We decided the type of information we wanted to collect on the first lecture itself and started working out the questions we would like to ask. Setting the questionnaire wasn't an easy task as there were a lot of things to consider:

1. Scope of questions: we should set the scope as precise as possible so that we do not end up collecting junk information that couldn't be used.
2. Length of the questionnaire: it shouldn't be too long, as people will get bored and start answering questions half-heartedly
3. Literacy: since our target market is primary children, we need to bear in mind that they might not fully understand certain questions, so we need to design the questionnaire in such a way that it is easily understood. 

It was quite a challenge for us as we kept contemplating which questions to keep and which to omit. Everything seemed so important for us to ask. Anyway, we finally managed to filter out the 'unnecessary' ones and squeezed everything into one page. phew

After the questionnaire was ready, it was time for us to conduct the survey. So, we went to a primary school to interview kids from primary 4-6 the following week.

Me interviewing a student

Ernie taking the height and weight of a student.

Meanwhile, we also conduct an online survey via Google forms to gather responses from parents in Malaysia. The survey was conducted for 5 days, and we managed to collect 179 responses in total. 

After the survey, comes the most mind consuming part of the whole domain, analysis of data. It wasn't that difficult given that we made use of google analytics where the data and analysis were already auto-generated. But the challenge here is synchronising and converting data from other groups to suit our design. I've spent hours cutting and pasting the data, moving in and out, trying to make most sense out of the sea of data. Haha, now I kinda regretted why didn't I take quantitative methods seriously. =X  It took us one and a half week to analyse the data and finally, these are the summary of the results we got: 

1. 37.8% of the school kids are either overweight or obese

1. Average allowance of children is RM3 while average expenditure is RM1.60.

1. Most of the children buys food from canteen

1. Children and parents both prefer high carbohydrate food whereby rice is more popular among the kids and bread is more preferred by the parents. 

And then, another Monday came and it was time for us to present our findings.

Booorrriingggg~~ =O

The presentation turned out to be longer than planned. It took us two and a half hours for all three groups to present our findings. *Yawns The findings were almost the same across the three groups though the way presentation differed from group to group. Generally, our performance on that day was quite welcomed by Dr. Chong, but that's because she hadn't really nitpicked the presentation. She noted that we merely reported the data with very limited analysis, which makes the data meaningless. In order to do better in the coming domain presentation, we got to keep asking ourselves the purpose of the data we collect-- why do we need these information, what does these information mean, how can we make use of these data for our product development, etc. By that, only could we convince the panel and proof the validity of our data. 

That's it for our first domain, guess I should start doing some brain exercise to brace myself for the coming domain presentations. 

Cheers, 

Dong

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RL20140828: Introduction to Food Product Development

My apologies, peeps! I didn't realise that it took me that long to write this post, as I was still in the midst of editing the post for my Korean trip. Anyhow, work is work, I don't think I should further procrastinate or else the work would never be done. *Sorry, once again*

So, if you guys haven't noticed yet, this would be the final year for my undergraduate studies. *Where have the time been??!!  Which also means that pressure is more as we are entering the phase of writing thesis for our final year project (FYP hereafter). LOL! but at the same time, I am really excited for this final year because we finally get to do what we are supposed to do! R&D!! *YAY! So, this module, Food Product Development is the gist of the entire course. It requires knowledge from other modules and it spans over 2 semesters. Over the course, we would experience the entire process of research and development, from the initial stage of market study, ideation, coming out with few beta concepts, to deciding the alpha concept, developing the product and finally launching the product. Whew, that's a lot of work! Haha, but I'm sure it'll be super satisfying to see our product launch at the end of the day. Now, aren't you curious what are we doing for our project?

Tadaa.. Project of the Year! Innovative school meals with functional ingredients

Okay, so our project was about creating a healthier food product for school kids. Why? because it's a problem now many of them are suffering from obesity. Malaysia topped the South East Asian countries for being the fattest nation, while ranking no.6 worldwide. (Okay, these data might be a bit outdated because the survey is conducted every 5 years and the next one is due 2015) But isn't it scary? It is reported in a 2013 news article that  Malaysia is facing a 'double-burden' syndrome, where some are still suffering from under-nutrition on one hand, while on the other hand obesity becomes more prevalent. The article also mentioned that obesity is mainly due to rapid economic growth and globalisation, hence the word "globesity". But for me, it does not matter whether if its because of globalisation, because obesity is prevalent across all social classes, be it poor or rich. Heard of the poverty-obesity paradox? Poor people couldn't afford nutrient-dense food, thus surviving with cheap foods which are high in fats, carbohydrates and sodium. In other words, this group of people are actually at a higher risk of suffering from obesity. I can't say that this situation is exactly what's happening in Malaysia, but I'm very much convinced that this is one of the reasons other than a mere globalisation. 

One in four children in Malaysia is either overweight or obese.. x目

Anyway, the problem still goes back to the food children consume and their eating habit. So, in our   

FYP, we're to develop a product that could correct this problem, in terms of nutrition, as well as their eating habit. At the same time, we should also expect to raise children and parent's awareness on healthy eating through our product. I'm really excited with this idea, not only because we are free to develop our own product (our seniors had very specific theme), but it is also very meaningful, if this project is successfully launched in schools at the end of the day. It made me felt like I could make a change, that all the things I've learnt before finally have a purpose.. xD

Taken from: http://sts-international.org/tag/nelson-mandela/

Okay, so on the frst lecture, we started working on collecting ideas for the product, of which the first step is to carry our a market study by conducting a questionnaire. I'll elaborate more on that on the coming post. What we basically did was setting up a questionnaire to collect data that could be used to generate ideas later on, at the same time also verify significance of the problem. After we're ready with the questionnaire, we are going on a field trip to a primary school to conduct the survey. After which, we would analyse the data collected and decide the direction we are heading to.

Aite, that's about it for today!

'til then,
Dong

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Late night rant: What's the very criterion of an authentic food?

So I read about this news report about banning foreign workers as the main cook in hawker stalls just now. Content is roughly about how government of Penang is considering to ban the employment of foreigners as the main cook in hawker stalls in order to protect their food heritage. 

First off, kudos to the effort of preserving the food heritage! Penang has a state government I really look up to, from the efforts of conserving environment, to providing free wi-fi all over the state, to now, preserving the food heritage. Many of my friends are so excited about this that it flushed other feeds in my news feed.

I get it, this is to ensure that our culture will not be 'polluted' by foreign cultures, but isn't it too fast to celebrate? I mean, what about the food? Yes, my concern here is just the food! Why care about the cook when food is the culture/heritage itself?!

For me, to preserve the food heritage, the taste must at least to be maintained. I want the authenticity of the food to be preserved! I don't care who's behind cooking the dish, be it a foreigner or a local. I know many would argue that the heritage is not only about the food, there's a whole lot more, the history, the ambiance, including how is it prepared and served. So, of course the cook is an important factor. But now, let's say you're given two dishes: 

1. Sarawak Kuching laksa cooked by a local Kuchingite but tastes like curry laksa, with fish balls  as the condiments dafuq?
2. Kuching laksa that reminds you of 古早味 but cooked by a 'kakak'

I know both are a bit offsetting, but this is what's happening now. Anyway, I'll go for option 2. In fact, I'd be even happy because see, even a foreigner can master the essence of the dish, at least the dish won't go 'extinct'.. don't mind me, just me being 'ah Q' .. 

But yeah, shouldn't us be sad that even foreigners can cook our traditional dish better than locals? And that's why the Penang government is thinking of implementing this policy. This is like indirectly admitting that the younger generations are just a bunch of incompetent fellas who don't even appreciate their culture.

But even still, should the taste be compromised? I just couldn't get over it. I can't accept the fact that our food being 'polluted' by foreign or some funny elements. I get that chances are the foreign cook don't understand the food enough and couldn't execute the dish. But most of the time, what I got was those innovative locals trying to be creative and ruin the dish. If that's the case, I'd rather have a kakak cooking what is being taught. 

So what's your take on this? I'm eager to see the Penang government coming out with a satisfying resolution. =)

Good night,

Dong

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When ingredients are not the only considerations in a formulation...

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RL140630 Last lecture: But the journey still goes on.....

It's the time of the semester again, we've reached the last week of the semester. Since all the practicals and project were done, this week, we're left with the last lecture to close the chapter. This week, we talked about food additives.

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As I typed 'food additive' into the search engine, this was one of the very first picture that popped out. It's not surprising that the general public refers food additives as something deadly, considering how big a chaos had food additives scandals created a few years back. Still remember Sanlu milk crisis and Taiwan plasticiser scandal? 

I know the whole avoiding food additives in commercial food product mindset is getting more widespread, but today, I'm gonna tell you that food additives is something that couldn't be totally avoided and that it is not as scary as you imagined. Even our ancestors have been using food additives to produce food. I'm sure most of you agree with me that tofu is a healthy food, but do you know that tofu couldn't even set if not for the presence of gypsum (calcium sulfate)? Gypsum has been used as a coagulant for tofu since its invention more than 2 millennium ago. 

And it looks like this....

Feeling scary yet? You're still eating tofu happily... So, my point here is do not 'boycott' something until you understand what is it. There are all sorts of food additives out there, and all of them serves only one purpose, that is to improve the quality of food with a little amount added. Imagine jam without pectin and jelly without gelatine, they couldn't even form! Still remember the doughnut and cookie experiment before? Addition of a small amount of baking powder and emulsifier makes the whole thing so much better, be it in terms of texture, colour, or taste. 

But the question is, why are people still afraid of food additives?

According to the USFDA, food additives is defined as follows:

Any substance the intended use of which results or may reasonably be expected to result, directly or indirectly, in its becoming a component or otherwise affecting the characteristic of any food (including any substance intended for use in producing, manufacturing, packing, processing, preparing, treating, packaging, transporting, or holding food; and including any source of radiation intended for any such use); if such substance is not GRAS or sanctioned prior to 19581 or otherwise excluded from the definition of food additives.

See? As long as the substance added to food altered the quality and is GRAS (generally recognised as safe), it should not be a problem. The problem here is that, for the sake of profit, some unethical manufacturers did not follow the rules and regulations, and used additives that are not food-graded and did not get rid of it after processing. For example bleaching agents that are not evaporated off after processing, or like DEHP found excessively in some of the boba balls in Taiwan. I know one way to avoid consuming these substances is by avoiding processed food. But that shouldn't be the way. Bear in mind that even natural food contains toxicants. So, what for trying to avoid process food? If not for the usage of food additives, there won't be so many convenient and shelf-stable food, and it'd bring us back to the era where it took us hours to prepare a decent meal. Guess you wouldn't want to live in such unproductive society, would you? 

So, my suggestion is to understand your food and the risk of taking in the food. Choose your food wisely, eat in moderation and variety and that's all I can say. 

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Happy holidays peep!

Dong

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RL140624: It's finally ended...

OMG, what a haul we've been through, and we're finally seeing the end! Together with our juniors, we presented our hardwork to the 'big bosses' last Tuesday. And wow, was it a thrilling experience with the last minute surprise. That aside, we managed to pull through and the big bosses were really satisfied with the outcome!

RL140624: The D-day! (pun intended ;))

7.50am, I reached R&D kitchen well-prepared and full-spirited for the presentation in the noon. We've paid so much effort for this to come true, so I promised myself to go all-out and nail the presentation later. Although the rehearsal the day before was very messy as I was not really familiar with our new slides. Anyway, as I was getting ready, Helen came into the locker room and greeted me with her ever sexy and husky voice. Gosh, she lost her voice! of all time but this uber important day! If it were the usual me, I would be all panic and anxious. I didn't know where did I gain the confidence but I was not at all worried about the situation, and was positive that Helen can get her voice back by the afternoon. However, for 'insurance' I got Wilbert and Eugene to prepare for the presentation too. *fingers crossed*

The production that day went on smoothly. As we prepared the Asian paste and condiments before hand, we had ample of time left for the opor and rendang. We even had time to cook our 'staff meal'! 

My new creation- salted vege duck soup without salted vege.. Tastes superb!

Oh, so back to the project, BS4 joined us later of the day to get their dishes ready. We started around 1.40pm, when our industry partners arrived. We had our dean and the coordinator of this project together with us that day as the food tasting panels. Group 1 went first. Our guests were awed by their concept of pasembor pasta, and also liked their dry curry pasta. Coming up next was the presentation by BS4, and then group 2. We were the last group presenting. The best fish swims at the bottom heh? Just kidding

Okay, so the presentation was a long one, our guests were very meticulous I'd say. They paid attention to every single detail, thinking from different perspectives,  the feasibility of the production at central kitchen, reheating the food and serving at the outlet. I was amazed by their patience as they have been through so many dishes before, but could still manage to critically taste our food. 

Me and Helen presenting our dish...

According to their feedback, the opor chicken (now named as creamy turmeric chicken pasta) tasted like ayam percik, which I have no idea what was it at all. LOL! It did not caught their attention anyway. But the response for our Rendang received a very welcoming once again! Yay to that! Surprisingly, they liked my Asian pasta as well. Haha, it was something unexpected, but strangely acceptable and addicting. 

So, there you go, we ended the session after our presentation. They were really satisfied with our performance, and said that they will feature some of our dishes on their menu! That's cool, imagining people ordering the dish I created in a commercial outlet. That's really gratifying! =) 

Group photo time! Say cheese =D

Oh ya, I wasn't sure if it's appropriate to disclose the restaurant before, but since they're operating now, I felt like giving a heads up to all of you! Simplyd by The Delicious Group is now open at nuSentral. Please support them as a form of support to us too! =D Like their facebook for more info and promotions!

Cheers, 

Dong

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RL 140610/140617 Last Tryout +Touching up: Counting down for the D-day.....

Hola, people! The follow up for our pasta project is here! I just realised I haven't been updating on the pasta project since week 7.. oops, there actually weren't much progress since then.. Anyway, we've finalised all our products and we're about ready to present our hard work to Group E next week. Woah, where have the time passed? 

RL140610: Last try out

So basically after the 2nd try-out, we had another try-out last week. I modified my Asian Paste again, with less peanuts this time, and added sourness with lime powder. I tasted closer to the first trial, but the paste was still fibrous nonetheless. The recipes for opor ayam and beef rendang were kept the same, except we fine tuned the taste and consistency by standardising the cooking time and temperature.

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We also simulated the production process that would be carried out in the central kitchen in the R&D kitchen, from cooking to storage to testing the product stability. The product were prepared as usual, but we added some technical ingredients to the product and see it improved the quality of the product. Since we were planning to keep our meat products in the freezer (with vacuum pack), shelf stability in terms of microbiological quality wasn't the biggest concern. What we worried was the potential splitting in our opor, and also the loss of crispiness of our fried chicken. So, we tested on the both products. Opor was vacuum packed and stored in the freezer, and checked one week later for the homogeneity of the gravy. Crisp film was added to the fried chicken batter to check if the crispiness is retained. 

At the end of the day, we also had external panels to taste our food. I was glad that all our food actually suits the panel's taste bud, our cheesy rendang was a hit! But there's something with my Asian pasta.. hmm, how to put this in words? It definitely tastes like something from this region, but we just can't come out with a description. It doesn't seem to resemble any of the dishes out there, except it's presented pretty much like nasi lemak. Bizarre, much? LOL! Anyway, I still have to improve my paste as it is still very fibrous. 

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The session ended with the end of food tasting, and fingers crossed for the product to turn out good. 

RL140617: For the D-day

We had our final touch up, fine tuning the dishes according to the comments in the previous food tasting session. Great news here, I finally got my Asian paste right!! =D It's no longer fibrous as I didn't blend the galangal together with the other ingredients. The taste is also very balanced this time around. 

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We also checked on our product, after keeping it for one solid week. It turned out that everything was still in good condition. Even for the fried stuffs I kept in the cabinet! The fried chicken was also not bad, as in the it was still crunchy on the outside, and juicy on the inside, after I reheated in the oven. There's actually not much difference between the gold standard and crisp film version, so we decided to keep to the gold standard. 

Yeah, another thing, we also had a trial presentation that morning. The overall presentation was so long that I lost my concentration already halfway through group 2's presentation. *sorry bow* Basically, I think all of our presentations lack the wow factor. Imho, it was way too boring and I doubt if anyone can follow the presentation. In addition to that, I found that most of us are also not confident in our own product. How are we suppose to convince the others to accept our dish when we ourselves sounded so timid. Haha, guess everyone has to brush up their presentation skills. 

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As for our group's presentation, we generally performed slightly better than the other two groups, because we were the last to present. So, we had time to modify our presentation according to the comments given to the previous groups. But then again, our presentation was not perfect too, and that's partly because of the introduction, it was all over the place and Dr Chong said she can understand better just reading at the slides. Not to blame anyone, but Wilbert, please get over your stage fright!! It's not like you're not prepared, just speak like how you usually do! 

Oops, I think I wrote a bit too long.. I'll be right back with the results of the project!

Till then, 
Dong

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RL 140609 Lecture 11: Proteins Part II [continued...]

Remembered 2 weeks ago when we entered the topic proteins, we were talking about wheat gluten (plant proteins). This week, we wrapped up the lecture with animal proteins, milk and egg proteins. Then I just realised that Dr. Chong left us a couple of questions unanswered, so I'm making use of this post to answer the questions as a form of revision. =)

RL 140609 Lecture 10: Clearing my debt....

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1. What are the wheat flour alternatives? Which are gluten-free, which are non gluten-free?

How well do you know your flour?

As I mentioned before,  gluten is a big big concern for celiac disease patients. So while they can't exposed to a tiny bit of gluten, they still want to enjoy wheat flour products such as cakes, breads, noodles, and pastries. In these cases, wheat flour have to be substituted by other kinds of flour. These substitutes can be totally free of glutenin and/or gliadin, which makes it totally gluten free, while others have a different ratio compared to wheat. All these could affect texture of a food, lesser in cakes and pastries, but more in breads and noodles. Functions and effects aside, what are the examples of gluten-free flour and non gluten-free flour?

Generally, grains are the items to watch out for gluten, while other parts of a plant such as tubers (potatoes), roots (tapioca) and legumes (soybeans, mung beans, etc) are gluten-free.

Most grains, including corn, buckwheat, and rice are totally 'gluten-free', which leaves a minority of grains to be non gluten-free (eg. wheat, barley and rye). Hence, celiac disease patients should totally avoid those grains. Oat is a special case where oats itself is gluten-free, but cross-pollination between wheat and oats are so common that some oats became capable of producing glutenin and gliadin, making it non gluten-free. Same goes to soybeans. For a more extensive explanation and examples, you could refer here. 

2. Whipping cream vs light cream vs half-and-half vs heavy cream?

Difference is in the fat content!

Half-and-half is the lightest of all, containing 12% fat, followed by light cream, 20%, then whipping cream 35%, and lastly heavy cream 38%. The higher the fat content, the creamier is it, and the more stable is also the foam formed. Hence, baking recipes (requires foaming) often call for heavy cream, while lighter cream is sufficient for cooking/beverage recipes (which does not requires foaming). 

More reading: here and here. 

3. Why does mustard has emulsifying properties?

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Mustard seeds has equal amount of fats, carbohydrates and proteins, and contains mucilage, a kind of plant glycoprotein. Mucilage is a polar molecule and is also able to interact with both water and fats, giving it the ability to form suspension. More details here.

4. Factors affecting coagulation of egg proteins...

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Promoting factors:

1. Salt: Salt forms ions in water and interact with ionic functional groups. This increases the ionic interaction between the polypeptide chain (salt bridge/attraction force) bringing them closer together, hence increasing the tendency of forming disulphide bonds.
2. Number of eggs: Increased number of eggs increased the concentration of egg protein, hence increased interactions, and thus easier to form dispulphide bridge. 
3. Vinegar/lemon juice: decrease pH, bringing the proteins towards the isoelectric point, causing the proteins to coagulate.

Obstructing factors:

Sugar: Sugar can react with the polar side chains of proteins by forming hydrogen bonds, making the side chains unavailable to react with another protein. As a result, the association of protein molecules is delayed.

5. Duck egg vs chicken egg...

It's said that duck eggs are more flavourful than chicken egg.. what say you?

Duck egg and chicken egg, what makes them different? Basically, the genetic composition would be different, since it's from two different species. Other than that, the chemical composition of the two are similar. The yolk contains majority fats, with duck having more than chicken, while the whites are just water and albumin. But there're still people who prefers duck egg more than chicken egg, cause they said it's richer and 'saltier'. Well, the saltiness might be because of the higher sodium content in duck egg, but I think it's basically just a myth since duck eggs are always preserved with salt. However, I can't deny that duck egg is much flavourful since it contains more fat, which could give the richer and creamier sensation. So, I guess it shouldn't be a big problem to substitute chicken egg with duck egg in a recipe. It might have a shorter texture and tastes richer and more moist. Bear in mind duck eggs are bigger than chicken eggs, it might not be advisable to substitute one-to-one. =)

That's about all for this week's reflective learning...

So long till the next post!
Dong

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RL140603 Practical 4: Fats and fat replacer

Last practical of the semester! Phew, after this I'd have lesser workload (hopefully) since there's no more experimental food reports to write. I was all the while anticipating for this moment to come, but why do I feel a tinge of emptiness? Reluctant much, huh... Anyway, this week's practical was about replacing fats with emulsifiers.

RL 140603 Practical 4: DMG or SSL?

Butter cookies! What comes into your mind when you think of cookies?

:: Sweet, buttery, crumbly, fattening, guilt..... Oh, please don't tempt me even with the word.. Just felt like dressing up now, on a sunny Sunday afternoon, enjoy a smooth cup of earl grey to accompany this buttery treat.......

Okay, I should just stop day dreaming. Yes, so when most of us heard of the word butter cookies, the first thing that come into our minds is butter. You don't say? Then many ladies will start to treat this like the most evil thing in the world, just because it's fattening.. So in this practical, we tried to use emulsifiers to create butter cookies with lesser fat content. What we did was first to add emulsifiers to the original recipes, then based on the outcome, we formulate a new butter cookie recipe with lower fat content. So here's what we got:

Gold standard- crumbly and buttery, just like a good ol' butter cookie. 

Cookies added with emulsifier: Looks even more attractive, tastes even more buttery.

So, what we got was after adding emulsifiers (in this practical, we used sodium stearoyl lactylate, SSL, and distilled monoglyceride, DMG) was the cookies became more fragile/crumbly. However, taste wise, the original cookies actually tasted better. The ones added with emulsifiers had a mix of flour and butter taste which is a little overwhelming. Ugh, not my kind of cookies. Of course, what we did was adding emulsifiers to the same recipe with same amount of fats, hence it turned out too buttery. So what if we reduce the fat content, wouldn't it taste the same, given it had lesser fat? 

Guess we're wrong! This could actually pass as a cracker except its too thick!  kck, is that my tooth chipping off?

So, as you can see from the pictures, the cookies we made with 25% reduced fat were not at all appealing. It was hard (some would say crunchy) and bland. It was still a good start to me nonetheless. At least we knew that even though emulsifiers can reduce fat usage, we should always bear in mind that it could not substitute fats completely, and that different emulsifiers work differently, because the cookies other two groups made (using DMG) looked totally fine! though I still prefered the original ones. So what actually made the difference?

 

Structural formula of DMG

Stuctural formula of SSL

See the difference? They are two different molecules. Haha, not funny.. The main difference is their hydrophilic/lyophilic balance, HLB. DMG has low HLB (long R group), hence working better in a water in oil emulsion, whereas SSL has high HLB (strong ionic strength), so it works well in a oil in water emulsion. Back to the cookies,where the source of water and fats are from butter, and butter is ~80% fats, ~16% water. So isn't it clear now? Obviously DMG could work better in dispersing water in the pool of fats, and that explains why our cookies ended up so tough and bland. We didn't have enough water, but adding too much water would also dilute the taste and hardened the texture... Argh!

Lesson learnt. Use DMG as your fat replacer if you're making butter cookies. =)

[ :: ] ( :: ) Now, I've made some virtual cookies for you and thanks for reading! ( :: ) [ :: ]

Dong

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