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These a from a Forbes article on the most expensive Wiskeys
The world’s most expensive whiskey - but its sold out!
So you have the chance of this one thats “on the shelves”!
While there is no doubt that weather, biofuels and changes is demographics are setting the poor of the world up for really hard times for the next few years, their is a lighter side which would have amused Maria Antoinette - if they can’t get food give them cake!
The £50 espresso is made from a blend of two coffee beans; Jamaican Blue Mountain and Kupi Luwak which comes from Indonesia and are harvested by civets who sniff out the choicest berries, digest the flesh, and pass out the bean in the way that nature intended.
What is interesting that the cost is simply a function of the high cost of the coffee beans which are real food ingredients. There are other foods where the price is a function of a non food ingredient, like the $1.4m (£700,000) Strawberries Arnaud, which, in addition to the strawberries, boasted a 4.7-carat pink diamond ring.
However, those listed below are expensive because of their food ingredients
The £85.50 sandwich
Britain’s most expensive sandwich was created by Scott McDonald, chef at Selfridges food hall, in August 2006. He used Japanese wagyu beef, foie gras, black truffles and salad. Selfridges catering manager, Ewan Venters, claimed: “If you are a food lover, this represents great value for money.”The £8,000 pie
Spencer Burge of the Fence Gate Inn in Burnley, Lancashire, created a pie in 2005 whose ingredients included wagyu beef, matsuke mushrooms from China, French bluefoot mushrooms and winter black truffles, all cooked in two bottles of 1982 Chateau Mouton Rothschild. Discerning diners could buy a slice for a mere pounds 1,000.The $1,000 pizza
The Manhattan restaurant Nino’s Bellisimo unveiled a $1,000 (pounds 500) pizza in March 2007 made with 225g of Imperial Reserve Persicus caviar from Iran and thinly sliced lobster tail, resting on a creme fraiche sauce.The £600 salad
The world’s most expensive salad was created by chef Raymond Blanc in 2003 - the Florette Sea and Earth salad used almas and beluga caviar, langoustines, Cornish crab and Florette baby leaf salad.
A previous post looked at consumer food trends from a British source and noted the lack of such a list from Africa.
Now another view on Food Trends, this time American
Comparing the two is informative
Organic and Health are of interest to both while the environment is of no interest to the Americans (while Bush rules anyway) and Portion control is on no interest to the British.
Maybe the biggest difference which is reflected in the focus on taste based trend in Britian - maybe the Americans food taste matches their beer taste which is sad!
Energy and Food Waste are becoming major issues in Africa at present, with warning of dire consequences if the existing trends continue. One technology that sits at the intersection of these sectors is the treatment of processing waste using anaerobic digestion - or biogas.
Biogas is a simple process that is used at household level by millions and is increasingly being used in Europe as part of the sustainable energy drive.
There has recently been news of commercial approach in Canada
Ontario-based StormFisher Biogas is forming partnerships with North American food and drinks firms to allow it to use the organic by-products of farming and food processing operations to produce and sell renewable energy.
“Food processors typically send their by-products to landfills or compost sites. Since we are able to extract more value from these by-products by using the energy they create, we are able to charge a lower disposal fee than landfill and compost sites”.
He added that another advantage afforded processors was environmental stewardship: “This allows food processors to reduce greenhouse gas emissions since the gases that are produced by these by-products are used to create energy, rather then seeping into the atmosphere.”
“When captured and used to generate energy, however, methane serves as an excellent fuel and provides the dual environment benefit of being sequestered from the atmosphere and displacing traditional, polluting forms of energy like coal.”
The snack food market is predicted by Global Industry Analysis (GIA) to grow during the next few years, contradicting a feeling that consumers would eat less of these unhealthy food.
The reasons for this appear to be the introduction of healthier snacks by many manufacturers and growing markets in for example Asia, Eastern Europe and Latin America
The suppliers of equipment to the food industry are a source of information that should not be overlooked.
In this case I have taken a screenshot from the webpage of GEA Niro which presents one of their spray dryers in some detail. This type of information, along with much other on their website, is very useful for the food processor wanting to understand processes and equipment.
What is important though, is to understand that when using this type of information, you are looking at the information of a supplier who is actually on line to sell their equipment.
However, they are industry leaders so you can be sure that their information is representative of the industry. I will be trying to add this kind of link for different companies periodically.
Although Niro is originally a spray dryer manufacturer, there is a range of information on spray drying, freeze drying, extraction, evaporation, freeze concentration and membrane filtration on the website.
This free book can be obtained at the website of the New Zealand Institute of Food Science and Technology.The book is published in flash but gives assistance in how to print chapters and how to download to use offline.
The book is a detailed engineering approach to the processes that make up food manufacturing businesses. It includes detailed calculations, diagrams, charts and flowsheets.
While the book covers detailed information that is probably not usable by everyone, there are also simple general descriptions that would be useful to anyone approaching new plant and processes.
This Technical Bulletin from Practical Action gives details on drying, milling and packaging chillies.
The bulletin gives information on both solar drying which works well in dry weather and other dryers than can be used when the humidity is higher.
The article can be viewed in text format online and can be downloaded as a pdf document with pictures. To download one needs to register, but their is no charge.
The article includes the contact details of two dryer suppliers, but they are both in India. This is an issue I think we could try and address - the supply of up to date and more comprehensive lists of suppliers.
