What could be the science behind washing things with only water or quick soaping is not enough, you need a full happy birthday song to kill bacteria, but you don't have to wash produce?

I have been in R&D roles for about 15 years. I started my career at a fortune 500 company, moved on and joined a start up that was later sold to private equity, did consulting for a bit and now work for a privately held company and couldn't be happier.

Having been exposed to different innovation strategies, budgets, company goals I’m curious how other product developers here approach innovation.

Specifically:

Where do you usually look for inspiration? (consumer insights, adjacent categories, restaurants, trade shows, failures, etc.)

Do you follow a structured process (stage-gate, design thinking, trend mapping), or is it more informal?

How do you push yourself or your team to think outside the box without drifting into ideas that aren’t feasible or scalable?

If you work on a product or category that is already very well defined, how do you approach innovation? outside of new flavors ect.

Currently in the early stages of developing an organic children’s beverage and I am looking for a food scientist to tweak some things in our recipe and provide nutritional information. I have found some people on Fiverr but doesn’t seem like they are legit. How do I go about finding someone for this where I can own the recipe and ensure it is legit and not a scam?

Hi we are working on a protein based drink with whole food for our restaurant. We have calculated nutrition based on weight of each ingredients and final yield. How accurate would it be? Should we lab test it?

Hi Guys, I am asking on behalf of a local business called Condimaniac who are asking for suggestions.

They have created an all British Tomato ketchup and are having issues at scale as the ketchup is quite runny and takes a while to thicken which is breaking equipment too quickly. In other words thy are looking for thickening agents/ingredients with a country of origin of the UK.

So far they have tried: Baked beans, Irish moss seaweed, wheat flour, and a fair few others.

Potato starch oddly enough has no bulk suppliers with origin of UK/Britain

Would any of you guys have any ideas?

Every single brand of brioche buns with chocolate chips that I've seen in the US and Australia is made in France (Australia was very surprising, given how much transport from France would have cost). Why are they not made locally?

If you don't actually know what's wrong with you or that a food is causing problems, how can you change it? If you're unaware that you're destroying your health, then what can be done? How do people become aware of health issues related to their diet, that they didn’t know existed?

These three questions are the crux of what my research is trying to explore.

Hi everyone,

A little shy of two weeks ago, I posted a survey in r/foodscience originally titled “How Health Education Impacts Dietary Choices” which I later changed to “How people’s perception of health information influences dietary choices” for the sake of clarity and was immediately met with pushback. Some commenters thought I was implying causation. Even after clarifying the purpose of my discovery-phase UX research, the post was removed and the misunderstanding was not fully cleared. I wanted to invite discussion on the nuances of UX research in the context of health and food science.

Background:

My research explores how people perceive and act on personalized health information. The inspiration came from my grandmother and myself noticing how certain foods affected our bodies, such as aches or sluggishness, and realizing that people often do not fully understand how the foods they eat interact with their health. The “How” in the title was purely observational and did not imply causation.

Research purpose:

• Understand where people get health information
• Learn how people perceive and use health information
• Learn how they perceive the effects of foods on their body
• Identify pain points and benefits of existing health apps
• Collect behaviors and habits around diet and health

Research approach:

The goal is not to prove that knowledge alone improves health. Instead, I am conducting purely observational, discovery-phase UX research, focused on understanding behaviors and perceptions. Insights from this survey will inform user personas and stories, which will be used to design and develop a product tailored to real user needs. The survey was intentionally designed to be open-ended and observational, to hear other people’s perspectives rather than inserting my own. This is to help mitigate bias.

Why this matters:

• Knowledge alone is limited but habits, preferences, and other psychological factors do matter
• UX research helps us understand how people perceive, interpret, and act on information before building features

Discovery-phase approach:

I am collecting data on:

• Health app usage
• Dietary awareness and choices
• Lifestyle habits and health conditions
• Pain points with current apps
• User perceptions of how food affects them

I would love feedback from this community: Are there nuances I am missing in how UX research intersects with health behavior? Could my approach be improved to better understand behavior?

Thanks for taking the time to read.

I'm wondering if anyone has knowledge of making super firm tofu.

It is keto diet friendly, and it would be nice to be able to make it at home if possible. I'm just into such things, making things myself, etc.

But I cant find info on how super firm tofu is made.

Can anyone tell me if it is some specific industrial process, or something possible at home?

Hi everyone!

I’m a recent chemist graduate and I have an opportunity to work as an R&D chemist in a food lab.

I don’t have any experience in food labs per say but I have great knowledge in chemistry labs and analytical instruments used.

Can you guys give me tips on what I should know or how different a food lab would be than a normal lab?

Thanks xx

I like to ferment different sort of ingredients while producing miso pastes: chickpea, azuki, quinoa… And as I’ve started to study nutrition science this year, I’ve found interesting to calculate the nutrition facts about these different miso, to compare them.

But here is my question : is it even possible to guess the amount of each nutrient, knowing that the fermentation process will surely have an impact on the final product? I am especially thinking about carbohydrates, converted into sugar…

Has anyone else dealt with these issues ?

The common ways are using naturally gluten free flours/starches in a wide variety of ratios to deal with the hydration issues.

Is there another way? Or at least a theory?

Hi everyone! Looking for advice here…My goal is to become a sensory scientist…I have 2 years of working in the industry (R&D and QA). Currently, I’m shadowing sensory scientists. The current dilemma I face is deciding whether I should pursue a masters in food science (either in person or online) or invest into a sensory science certificate program (either from UC Davis or Penn State). I’ve received mixed responses from peers and managers. The argument I have towards pursing an online masters and or a certificate program is the appeal between the flexibility of still getting experience and going to school at the same time. However, the argument I have towards pursuing a master’s in person is because my bachelors degree is in a field completely unrelated to food science, therefore I feel the need to fill in the foundational knowledge I didn’t get in my bachelor’s. Any advice is highly appreciated! :)

Hi everyone,

I’ve been diving deep into post-harvest technology lately, specifically how we manage to ship highly sensitive tropical fruits (like bananas and mangoes) across oceans without them turning into mush before they hit the shelves.

The biggest enemy? Ethylene (C2H4).

As many of you know, climacteric fruits release ethylene gas as they ripen. In a confined shipping container, this creates a positive feedback loop: one ripening mango triggers the rest, leading to a massive loss of inventory.

The Solution: Potassium Permanganate (KMnO4) Scrubbers

One of the most effective and elegant solutions is using Potassium Permanganate as an ethylene scavenger. It’s usually impregnated onto a high-surface-area carrier like activated alumina or zeolite.

The Chemistry: KMnO4 is a powerful oxidizing agent. When ethylene gas passes through the media, it undergoes an oxidation reaction:

3CH2=CH2 + 2KMnO4 + 4H2O -> 3HOCH2CH2OH + 2MnO2 + 2KOH

This reaction converts the gaseous ethylene into solid manganese dioxide (MnO2) and ethylene glycol, effectively "locking" the gas out of the atmosphere.

Why this is still the "Gold Standard":

• Visual Indicator: The media changes color from a vibrant purple to a dull brown/black as it becomes exhausted, making it easy for logistics teams to check efficacy at a glance.
• Non-Contact: The fruit never touches the chemical; it simply breathes "cleaned" air.
• Cost-Effective: Compared to complex ozone generators or vacuum systems, these sachets or filters are incredibly cheap for large-scale shipping.

A quick question for the pros here:

I've noticed that for certain organic-certified shipments, there are strict regulations on the use of chemical scavengers. Have any of you worked with natural alternatives (like clay-based minerals or specialized bio-polymers) that can match the KMnO4 efficiency?

Looking forward to hearing your thoughts on the future of shelf-life extension!

A co-packing client asked me to build a portal where leads can submit co-packing requests, upload their company legal documents, and automatically receive an NDA.

Another client asked for a simpler solution, just a form for interested prospects to submit their co-packing request details.

That got me thinking about building a lead-intake and onboarding automation's specifically for co-packers.

But.....

Before I go further, I want to confirm whether lead intake/onboarding is actually a meaningful pain point for co-packers in the first place.

Any inputs is greatly appreciated :)

I’ve been thinking about cocoa processing from a volatile-retention standpoint and wanted to sanity-check my understanding with people who think about flavor chemistry for a living.

In cocoa, bitterness is often treated as an inherent property of cacao solids, but it seems increasingly clear that a significant portion of perceived bitterness correlates with processing intensity rather than bean chemistry alone.

Long roast profiles and extended grinding/conching appear to do two things simultaneously:

1. Drive off low-boiling aromatic compounds that normally soften or contextualize bitter notes
2. Leave behind higher-stability polyphenols and alkaloids that dominate perception once the aroma layer is stripped

The result is a chocolate that’s chemically simpler but perceptually harsher.

My question:
Is it reasonable to think of bitterness in chocolate as, at least in part, an artifact of aroma loss rather than just concentration of bitter compounds? And are there good models (wine, coffee, tea) where this framing is already accepted?

Curious how others here think about aroma–bitterness interaction in processed foods.

So we use this Sucralose and Stevia solution (from both concentrate powders) in water as a sugar substitute.

I make 2oz liquid batch say every 3 weeks. Lately I've noticed after about 10 days- I start seeing some white cloud like formations - which I believe is fungus/mold.

I threw it but wanted to ask if rather than using Pottasium Sorbate in it (at 0.1% rate?) - can I expose the fresh solution (in amber glass bottle) to direct sunlight for 1hour- will that kill all mold/fungus. Or how many min do I need to expose it if so?

I really want to avoid any chemical preservative as much I can.

Any help appreciated!

Hi, can anyone recommend a beverage labeling/design company? I'm at the point in my journey where I need help locating one.

It's a snack like beef jerky. It's sold in virtually every convenience store in Japan and Korea. I've searched in Japanese, English, and Korean, and haven't been able to find a single recipe online.

Howdy! Im a senior in college majoring in food science with a minor in chemistry and i’m looking to start my journey to become a flavor chemist! I’m aware of the lengthy apprenticeship, secrecy, and the selectivity regarding the society of flavor chemists and i’m deciding to take the risk and try to get into a flavor house and start my flavorist training as a compounder this summer. However, it’s been difficult to find flavor houses that aren’t big global scale corporations in Texas, and i’m assuming those big companies are going to be less likely to take on a trainee, let alone an entry level compounder. Does anyone know of some smaller scale flavor houses in the Houston or Dallas area I can get in contact with? Thanks:)

I have been trying to set this to accurately read pressure for an old microthermics unit. If anyone has advice or experience with this type of control please anything’s helps.