3.6 Food provenance

This section requires students to demonstrate their knowledge and understanding of the following subject content:

Environmental impact and sustainability of food

Food Sources

Content

Students must know and understand

Suggested application and food preparation skills

where and how ingredients are grown, reared and caught.

grown ingredients: fruits, vegetables and cereals

reared ingredients: meat and poultry

caught ingredients: fish

an understanding of:

  • organic and conventional farming
  • free range production
  • intensive farming
  • sustainable fishing
  • advantages and disadvantages of local produced foods, seasonal foods and Genetically Modified (GM) foods.
 

Food and the environment

Content

Students must know and understand

Suggested application and food preparation skills

environmental issues associated with food.

  • seasonal foods
  • sustainability eg fish farming
  • transportation
  • organic foods
  • the reasons for buying locally produced food
  • food waste in the home/food production/retailers
  • environment issues related to packaging
  • carbon footprint.
  • Consider the seasons when selecting ingredients for recipes using fruits and vegetables (S2 and S3).
  • Using left over food to avoid wastage, whilst considering food waste.

Sustainability of food

Content

Students must know and understand

Suggested application and food preparation skills

the impact of food and food security on local and global markets and communities.

the challenges to provide the world’s growing population with a sustainable, secure, supply of safe, nutritious and affordable high-quality food.

Students must have an awareness of:

  • climate change
  • global warming
  • sustainability of food sources
  • insufficient land for growing food
  • availability of food
  • fairtrade
  • problems of drought and flooding
  • Genetically Modified (GM) foods
  • food waste.
 

Food processing and production

Food production

Content

Students must know and understand

Suggested application and food preparation skills

primary and secondary stages of processing and production.

how processing affects the sensory and nutritional properties of ingredients

  • primary processing related to the: rearing, fishing, growing, harvesting and cleaning of the raw food material (milling of wheat to flour, heat treatment of milk, pasteurised, UHT, sterilised and micro-filtered milk)
  • secondary processing related to: how the raw primary processed ingredients are processed to produce a food product (flour into bread and/or pasta, milk into cheese and yoghurt, fruit into jams)
  • loss of vitamins through heating and drying
  • the effect of heating and drying on the sensory characteristics of milk.
  • Make dough for pasta, shape and finish dough using a pasta machine, shape and finish pasta (S5 and S10).
  • Water based cooking methods using the hob to boil the pasta (S6).

Technological developments associated with better health and food production

Content

Students must know and understand

Suggested application and food preparation skills

technological developments to support better health and food production including fortification and modified foods with health benefits and the efficacy of these.

  • cholesterol lowering spreads
  • health benefits of fortification
  • fortified foods: thiamin, niacin, calcium and iron added to white flour
  • folic acid and iron added to breakfast cereals
  • vitamins A and D added to fats and low fat spreads
  • the positive and negative aspects of the use of additives: colourings, emulsifiers and stabilisers, flavourings, and preservatives
  • the positive and negative aspects of Genetically Modified (GM) foods.

To examine, carry out sensory analysis and evaluate existing products that have been modified and fortified.