Contents Digest

Olive Oil Adulteration

Adulteration of food products is a serious problem for both consumers and the food industry. Unlike tam- pering incidents, in which the main intent is usually to blackmail a company by threatening to harm its customers, adulteration generally involves more subtle means of de- fi-auding consumers by the unde- clared admixture of cheaper ingredi- ents. In certain product sectors, the problem of adulteration may be exten- sive; for example, according to the 1990 Report on the Quality of Fruit Juices in the UK published by the UK Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, most fruit juices on the UK market at that time had been adulte'rated in some way. Adulter- ated products that can be produced more cheaply undermine the market for authentic products; in addition, they may be less nutritious, of

lower organoleptic quality, or even unsafe. The ability to detect aduher- ation is thus of importance in protect- ing the interests of both consumers and the manufacturers of authentic products. On page 3, Eunice Li-Chan discusses developments in detecting the adulteration of olive oil. Virgin olive oil is purchased lk)r its su- perior flavour and potential health benefits; accidental or deliberate adulteration may reduce these de- sirable qualities or even introduce harmful substances into the product. Because of the complexity and in- trinsic variability of authentic olive oils and their potential adulterants, combination of the techniques of the growing field of chemometnc~ with those of analytical chemistry is necessary for the unequivocal de- tection of the adulteration of olive oil.

Fat Functionality

The creation and improvement of reduced-fat foods remains a high priority for many food product devel- opers. Currently, there is no single fat replacer that can provide all of the desired sensory and functional qualities of the fats found in all products. Three main classes of fat replacers are available, each having different functional properties that result in both advantages and limi- tations in specific applications. In order to decide which fat replacer

to t~,e in a given application, it is important to consider which func- tional properties of the fat being replaced are most important in the particular product under consideration. On page 12, Paula A. Lucca and Beverly J. Tepper provide an over- view of the fat replacers currently available and discuss the need to gain further insight into understand- ing the fundamental basis of the vari- ous functional properties of fats in foods.

LAB Symposium

Lactic acid bacteria (LAB) are Vossen describes the latest advances impolaant in the production of vari- in our understanding of the genetics, ous types of fermented foods, and metabolism and potential appli- the potential health benefits of LAB cations of LAB. as presented at are the focus of continued interest, the 4th Syhaposium on Lactic Acid On page 24, Jos M.B.M. van der Bacteria.

A Chemical Engineering Approach

The chemical industry has benefited greatly front recent developments in computer-aided design and automatic control mechanisms as a result of its extensive use of mass and energy balance equations to model the per- formance of individual pieces of equip- ment or even entire processing plants. Traditionally, the food industry has relied less on modelling techniques and as a result it has not benefited as greatly from the advances in computer technology. K. Niranjan (page 20) dis- cusses the main problems that have prevented use of this approach in the past - lack of sufficient knowledge of the physicochemical properties of foods and how these are affected by processing, variability of the raw ma- terials, and the reliance on off-line techniques to determine the desired end point of a process - and argues that application of the chemical engin- eering approach will be of increas- ing value to a food industry facing increasing demands for automated production of more consistent, high- quality, minimally processed foods.

Gums and Stabilisers Conference

Mixed biopolymer systems are being exploited to produce fat replacers. stabilisers and textured products (see Eric Dickinson, TIFS October 1993; D.A. Ledward, TIFS December 1993). On page 27, G.J. Brownsey reports on the 7th Gums and Stabilisers for the Food Industry Conference, which brought together academics, industrial users and manufacturers sharing an interest in the characterization and applications of mixed polysaccharide systems,

Trends in Food Science & Technology January 1994 [Vol. 5]