dishing out New foods

　　新菜上桌

　　by Natalie M. Rosinsky

　　No peas or mashed potatoes fly through the air, but each year at the meeting of the Institute of Food Technologists, college students battle over whose idea for a new kind of food will be judged best. Six teams of food science and technology majors try to win top honors－ and a $1000 prize－in the annual Product Development Student Competition.For each of the last six years, a team from Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, has made it to this prestigious final round of competition.

　　Tracy Luckow, captain of the 1999 Cornell team, explains that food scientists consider social trends as well as available ingredients and equipment when designing a new food product. Tracy and her 14 teammates thought “Sweet Spots”－a microwavable apple coated with caramel and oat flakes and filled with vanilla ice cream －would be a crowd pleaser. After all, in this “era of indulgence” even health-conscious people eat “small portions of real desserts”.

　　“Sweet Spots” used the sturdy Jonagold apple developed by Cornell pommologists (apple specialists), ice cream made at the campus dairy, and peeling and coring equipment already available at the college’s Geneva, New York processing plant. The team met the big challenge of preventing ice cream from melting in a microwave oven by devising an ice-cream-filled tube coated with polyester and lined with foil. The tube is removed before you eat. Judges would evaluate the “feasibility” of this new product －whether it could be mass-produced economically with existing technology. “Marketability” －whether a product fills a unique spot for consumers, preferably through processes a manufacturer can patent as its own －would also be judged in the competition.

　　To reach the finalist stage, competing teams each February submit a written report to IFT judges that describes their product’s taste, stability, and compliance with safety and health regulations. They also submit one or more prototypes of their food. When a team is selected as one of the six finalists, Tracy says, students may (as her team did) “work up to the last minute” before the summer competition to fine-tune their product.

　　At the competition, after an oral presentation, poster display, and product sampling by judges, the proud “Sweet Spots” team found themselves in the “Sweet spot” of first runners-up. And it had all begun less than a year before, when Tracy Luckow was “eating an apple and didn’t want to get up to throw out the core. . . .”

　　Cornell University’s finalist entry in the 2000 IFT competition was “Salad Barz,” a snack food made with freeze-dried vegetables. David Feuerman, captain of the team, notes that they have appealed to health-conscious consumers by including cholesterol-lowering omega-3 fats, as well as vegetables, in their new product. David says the team’s big challenge was creating a mouth-satisfying texture for the “barz.” But life “dished out” a tough lesson to this hard-working, creative team. Because they failed to meet a deadline for the last written report, the Cornell students were disqualified from competing in the final round of competition.

　　“Coffee Capps” －a frozen dairy creamer created by students from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign －won first prize in the 2000 IFT student competition. This new product not only adds flavor but “forms a frothy foam when added to coffee.” To learn more about food science and other finalist entries in this annual competition, check out these Web sites:

　　http://www.ift.org/iftsa/competitions

　　(Institute of Food Technologists)

　　http://www.foodscience.cornell.edu/fsclub/productdevelopment

　　(Food Science Department and student club at Cornell University)

　　豆子和土豆泥不会在空中飞舞。然而，每年在食品技术学院的大会上，大学生们争论不休的是谁的新食物的想法会被评为最佳。在每年一次的产品开发学生竞赛中，食品科学和技术专业的6支参赛队的学生都会努力去赢得头等奖——1000美元的奖金。过去的六年里，纽约州伊萨卡的康奈尔大学每年都能进入这项有名竞赛的决赛。

　　特蕾西·鲁克罗是康奈尔大学1999年参赛队的队长。她解释说，在设计一种新的食品时，食品科学家要同时考虑社会趋势和能够获得的配料和设备等因素。特蕾西和她的14名队友认为一种名为“甜点”的食品会受到大众的欢迎。这是可以经过微波炉加热的苹果，外面裹着焦糖和燕麦面粉，中间夹入香草冰激凌。毕竟，在这个“纵情享受”的时代，即便是最具有健康意识的人士也要尝试“一小份真正的甜食”。

　　“甜点”这种食品使用的是生长旺盛的约拿固德苹果。这种苹果是由康奈尔大学的苹果专家培育的。使用的冰激凌是校园的牛奶场生产的。而削皮和除核设备在位于校园里的纽约食品加工场内就能找到。他们面临的巨大挑战是要防止冰激凌在微波炉中熔化。为此，他们设计了一个盛满冰激凌的管子。管子外面用带铝箔的聚酯纤维包裹。在吃之前，你要拿掉管子。评委们要审查生产这种食物的可行性，即是否能用现有技术大规模地、低成本地生产。在竞赛中他们还要考虑这一产品的市场销售前景如何，即产品是否能填补消费者的一个空白，最好是经过一系列的过程，生产商能够对此产品申请专利。

　　要进入决赛阶段，参赛队每年二月要向食品技术学院的评委们提交一份书面报告。这份报告描述了产品的口味、稳定性以及是否符合安全和健康规定。他们还要提交一个或多个食物样品。特蕾西说，当一支队被选为参加决赛的六强之一时，为了使他们的产品精益求精，学生们会（他们当时就是这样做的）“拼命到夏天决赛前的最后一分钟”。

　　决赛时，当进行完口头陈述、宣传展示和评委抽样后，自豪的“甜点”队发现自己处于“甜蜜的位置”——亚军的地位。而所有这一切不到一年前才开始。那时，特蕾西·鲁克罗正在“吃一个苹果而不愿起身扔掉果核……”

　　2000年，康奈尔大学参赛队进入食品技术学院的决赛时做的菜是“沙拉巴兹”。这是一种由冷冻干蔬菜制成的零食。参赛队的队长大卫·福尔曼注意到这道菜正好满足了有健康意识的消费者的口味，他们的新产品中加入了能降低胆固醇的俄梅拉三型脂肪和蔬菜。大卫说他们这支队遇到的巨大的挑战是为巴兹创造出口感好的结构。然而生活给了这支辛勤工作的富有创造性的队伍一个严厉的教训。因为他们在最后期限之前没能提交最后的书面报告，康奈尔大学的学生被淘汰出局，没能参加最后一轮的比赛。

　　“咖啡开普”是一种冷冻的奶油。这是由来自伊利诺斯州立大学的学生创造的。他们在2000年的食品技术学院的学生竞赛中获得了一等奖。这种新产品不仅能增加咖啡的口味，还能产生一层浓浓的泡沫。

　　Prototype An early example or sample of something, on which later improvements might be based