Year: 2016

October 12, 2016

Food Investigation – flour for bread NEA 1

 

Look at our 2 YouTube videos to give step by step to help carry out a Food Investigation for Bread flour.

Bread flour Food Investigation

Bread flour results as evaluation

Task 1: Food investigation (30 marks) to find students’ understanding of the working characteristics, functional and chemical properties of ingredients.

Flours you can use for bread – strong white bread flour, wholemeal bread flour, Unbleached bread flour, very strong white flour, seed and grain flour..

Wheat is rich in gluten, a protein that gives dough its elasticity and strength. When yeast and flour are mixed with liquid and then kneaded or beaten,gluten forms and stretches to create a network that traps the carbon dioxide bubbles produced by the yeast. This gives the bread its texture.

Strong bread flour gives the best results in bread making as it is high in gluten.

Breads made with whole wheat grains and whole wheat flour have a rich flavor as well as a coarse texture and dark brown colour.

Wholemeal flour is made from the whole wheat grain with nothing added or taken away.  It will produce a bread which is more dense than a white loaf.

You can mix wholemeal flour with white flour to give a lighter loaf.

Flour with added grains or seeds  can add texture to the bread and will often give the bread a lovely nutty flavour.

White flour usually contains around 75% of the wheat grain. Most of the bran and wheatgerm have been removed during the milling process. produces a lighter loaf than wholemeal flour.

Wheatgerm – This can be white or brown flour with at least 10% added wheatgerm.

Stoneground  is wholemeal flour ground in a traditional way between two stones.

NEA – Compare the flours used in bread making.

What results do you want?

  • A light, spongy loaf
  • A good crust
  • Good flavour
  • Stretchy dough – high in gluten
  • Well risen dough

For the investigation I am going to use – Strong white flour, Strong wholemeal flour, white self raising flour, white plain flour.

 

This shows the star profile using the Nutrition Program 

TRY OUR FOOD QUIZ 2

Star profile gluten in bread with evaluation – you need to annotate results.

 

 

 

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NEA1 Food Investigations 10 tasks published 2018

October 4, 2016

Chemical raising agents – NEA 1

Food Science You Can Eat - all the science you need for Food GCSE
Food Science You Can Eat by Jenny Ridgwell – all you need for Food GCSE

NEA1 Investigations available on this link. Please this book was written in 2016 so check exam spec.

For my Chemical raising agents investigations I tested different raising agents in warm water. See the results on this link.

When the scones were baked I took photos. They are a bit burnt! I made batches with different raising agents to compare.

Presenting results

I used The Nutrition Program to present the results of the tasting. This is how it is done.

Open the Program

Click My Recipes and name one as Scones for test or something like that.

Put in each scone recipe in Ingredients.

Go to Star Profile.

Star profile for chemical raising agents

For each Taster put in the name of the raising agents – I’ve chosen plain + baking powder, SR + baking powder, plain + bicarb and tartar, SR flour

Then think of Descriptors for sensory appraisal – your tasting work.

I’ve chosen light, well risen, crumbly, solid

Then I tasted the scones and gave each a mark out of 5 where 0 = not and 5= very.

This is function is added to The Nutrition Program for NEA 1 test – Click Hide Rating.

Star profile for chemical raising agents

I can now see the Star Profile with each scone tasted.

Then I can write my Evaluations.

Evaluation of raising agents

Then Download as JPG and write some comments

Full marks I hope!!

All this work and more appear in Food Science You Can Eat 

 

 

September 14, 2016

Pickled onions – the science

Pickled onions with star anise, mustard seeds and peppercorns

Pickled onions with star anise, mustard seeds and peppercorns

Seal in jars and leave for 6 weeks to infuse

Seal in jars and leave for 6 weeks to infuse

Ingredients

600ml brown malt vinegar

500g small pickling onions

25g table salt

100g brown sugar

10 peppercorns

2tsp mustard seeds

4 star anise
(You can swap spices to your own taste so use coriander or cumin seeds, chillies and bay leaves.)

Method

  1. Put the unpeeled onions in a large bowl and pour over some very hot water water. Leave for a minute then pour into a colander or sieve to remove the water.
  2. The onion skins should peel off very easily! But watch out they can make you cry.
  3. Put the peeled onions a bowl and sprinkle with salt. Turn the onions with your hands to coat each one with salt.
  4. Cover and leave overnight or up to 24hrs.
  5. Pour the vinegar and sugar into a large saucepan with the peppercorns, mustard seeds and star anise. Boil then remove from the heat, cover with a lid and leave to let the vinegar absorb the flavour of the spices.
  6. Next day rinse the onions well to remove the salt and dry with a paper towel.
Pack the onions into sterilised jars.
  7. Pour over the vinegar, including the mustard, peppercorns and star anise, to cover the onions. Seal and allow to mature for 6 weeks.

The science bit

Adding salt to the onions before they are pickled, removes some of the water in the onion cells by osmosis. Removal of water helps the onions keep longer as bacteria, yeasts and moulds cannot multiply so quickly.

The onions are pickled in a sugar, spice and vinegar solution.

The vinegar changes the pH and prevents the enzymes and the microorganisms from working so the onions are preserved and keep for a long time.

My blog on Cooking in the 1970s

Here is the link to my pickled onion lesson of 1972.

 

It made the boys cry but the room had wonderful smells of pickling!

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September 8, 2016

Making kefir from kefir grains

Kefir is the latest super food so I’m having a go at fermenting water kefir grains to ‘make an alternative to fizzy drink’ and that doesn’t mean champagne

Kefir is a fermented pro-biotic food made from fermenting micro-organisms. Water kefir is made from fermenting the kefir grains in sugar and water.

So the science on the website says:

The beneficial bacteria and yeasts present in the kefir grains metabolise the sugar and turn it into acetic acid.

The grains look like clear, colourless jelly and they are made of ‘lactobacillus hilgardii’.kefir

Method

Dissolve 60g of sugar in 750ml water.

Add the grains and some fruit flavours such as lemon and raisins or chopped ginger root.

Let it ferment in a glass jar for 24-72 hours with a J cloth as a soft lid.

strain the grains and put the strained liquid into smaller jars.

Leave 24-48 hours to ferment then chill and enjoy as a drink.

What the scientists think about kefir and probiotics.

‘There is no benefit to probiotics to repopulate gut bacteria – ref European Food Safety Authority.

Nutrition for 100ml

Typical Values per 100ml
Energy kJ 243
Energy kcal 58
Fat (g) 3.0
of which saturates (g) 2.0
Carbohydrates (g) 4.6
of which sugars (g) 2.8
Fibre (g) 0.5
Protein (g) 3.2
Salt (g) 0.1

Milk kefir

Milk kefir is a natural probiotic, living culture and the grains look like small cauliflower florets. As the culture ferments the milk, these grains grow, creating new grains in the process.

Add a tablespoon of grains to about two cups of raw organic milk in a glass container and cover loosely to allow fermentation gases to escape. A piece of cheesecloth secured with an elastic band works very well.

After 24 hours strain with a plastic strainer into a container– do not use metal utensils. Place the grains that were caught in the strainer into another container with 2 cups of milk to make a fresh batch of kefir. The strained milk can be used or refrigerated until required. Repeat this process about every 18 – 24 hours.

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