"industry" news and stories

The Guardian recently featured a piece about the increasing amounts of soy in European and American diets. While many associate soy with centuries-old Eastern traditions, The Guardian article points out that soy products like tofu and soy sauce differ from the soy milk and soy burgers of today in that the older foods have been tempered by fermentation. Several sources in the piece voice concerns about phyto-estrogen levels in unfermented soy products and their possible links to cancer and unusual hormonal development. Some experts warn that the newness of such products is a cause for caution as their longterm effects have yet to be studied in depth.

Last year, a product called Flavor Spray was picked as one of the top five food innovations of the year by Time magazine. At the time, I didn't realize it was going to catch on in such a big way, but now other companies are introducing flavored spray-on products in an astounding variety of flavors. Besides the  root beer or french fry sprays (yes, they're working on a french fry flavor at the moment) from Flavor Spray, there are butter sprays, salad dressing sprays, candy sprays and even pet food sprays. The company that makes the TooTarts Sour Blast candy spray is designing a candy spray, to be released next year, to help "trick" kids into eating their vegetables.

Some spray-able products seem useful, like the butter and salad sprays that would allow for even distribution of flavor over corn on the cob or a big plate of salad. But french fry flavor? Mochaccino flavor?

I can't see the trend for the more exotic and less practical flavors lasting for an extended period of time, unlike the dressings and sprays of olive or canola oil that can be used for cooking. But what do I know - I still uses spices to flavor my foods.

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Apparently it is no longer "Cool-2B-Real." Some of you may remember a site by that name, created a few years ago by the National Cattleman's Beef Association as a way to get teen and "tween" age girls to keep eating beef. That age group is rather prone to going vegetarian, says a Time article about the site. As this online petition against the site reminded me, Cool-2B-Real featured a survey with the question "What type of beef do you most like to eat with your friends?"  If I recall correctly, the site also featured a blurb from a young female figure skater that was somehow related to eating beef. I recently went to check up on the site, and to my surprise, I found Zip4Tweens. Using numbers instead of words is obviously still cool, but this kid-geared beef site isn't nearly as bizarre as Cool-2B-Real. There are still plenty of beef recipes and diet-related games, but damn it, it's just not as weird. I think I actually saw some salad recipes on there.

The editors of BevNET, a beverage industry news and review site, launched their BevBlog a few weeks go. So far, the blog features commentary on beverage marketing, such as the redesigned Sprite can and the POM Tea line. Really, most of the posts focus on what the BevNET editors consider failed attempts and near misses in beverage advertising and packaging. Not that there's anything wrong with that. It's a fun read and I look forward to seeing what it turns into in the future.

McDonald's senor global supply chain manager, Gary Johnson, stressed the importance of establishing traceable beef programs worldwide. Consumers want to know where their food is coming from, he said, and consumer trust is of paramount importance to all businesses, especially those in the food industry. The call for action comes in light of the fact that the British beef industry is still recovering from the massive loss of consumer confidence it suffered following a mad cow outbreak in the mid 1990s. It is also, in part, due to the success of the Australian beef industry in implementing a system to track all beef cows back to their farm of origin. Johnson called for future programs to be modeled on the Australian example.

While there are some farms who take it upon themselves to offer traceable beef, many in the cattle industry oppose these measures, largely on the grounds that it would be too expensive to implement and maintain. If  a national or global plan were in place, however, consumers and businesses would rise to meet the price changes. "Any extra expense to introduce traceability today represents an essential investment in the security of the future safety of the food supply, [Johnson] said."

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