Where do we draw the line between general chemistry and food innovation? It’s a difference without any meaningful distinction. Just ask the 750 or so Israeli Foodtech startups. That’s no typo. 750 Foodtech startups. If they have it their way, one day in the not-so-distant future, the 3D printer may be the new microwave of the 21st century! But are we ready to start printing our food? Don’t be so quick to react, especially if the ingredients taste better and are better for us.
The students, aboard some three hundred attendees, participated in FoodTech Nation 2018 conference last month, an occurrence control to celebrate the institution’s seventy fifth day of remembrance. whereas showcasing future food product, the event additionally hosted food school researchers, professors, investors, entrepreneurs, and lecturers together with Dr. Oded Shoseyov, a Hebrew University academician of supermolecule engineering and nano-biotechnology acknowledged for his 3D printing school, and Dr. Alon Samish of the Davidson Institute of Science Education at the Chaim Azriel Weizmann Institute and also the founder and chief operating officer of Amai supermolecule, a procedure supermolecule style and biotech company.
An avocado energy bar, a “clean ingredient” food product coconut pudding, a Stevia-flavored natural paste cup, cocktails with natural pear sweetening, and frozen dessert created with supermolecule powder from dipteron larvae rounded out the innovative food school mixtures created and given by teams of scholars from a food development course at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem’s Henry M. Robert H. Smith college of Agriculture, Food and setting in Rehovot.
Israel is one amongst the highest countries within the world for innovation in food school, each Shoseyov and also the event’s organizer Oren Froy, head of the Institute of organic chemistry, Food Science, and Nutrition at Hebrew University stressed to NoCamels at the confab.
“First of all, there’s tons of startups in Israel in food technology,” Froy says, inform to Israeli company Tivall, that he says was among the primary to introduce meat substitutes into the market. Tivall is in hand by Osem, one amongst the most important food makers and distributors in Israel. 10 years past, Tivall signed associate agreement to buy the US company FoodTech for $20 million. FoodTech developed and marketed frozen meat substitutes sold-out within the US and North American country underneath the name, VeggiePatch.
Froy adds that Israel additionally makes property a high priority. “When we have a tendency to create new product we expect inexperienced, we expect regarding the way to create a product that’s higher for the setting, that wouldn’t damage or injury the setting and minimize refuse,” he says.
Froy suggests that food school leadership may additionally stem from the challenges expose by growing crops in Israel’s dry climate.
Featured article: Artificial Intelligence, part 1.
“I assume it will play a task, the very fact that it’s associate arid place here, however, we have a tendency to try and get {the higher|the higher} of it and use it to induce better product and fashionable product,” he says.
Israel is home to some 750 active startups and corporations within the food school and agriculture school industries, consistent with a could report by the Israeli non-profit Start-Up Nation Central.
Ahead of the event, yank international International Flavors & Fragrances (IFF) company noninheritable Israeli company Frutarom, one amongst the ten largest corporations within the field of flavors and fine ingredients, for $7.1 billion. A month before the acquisition, Frutarom {and the|and therefore the|and additionally the} Israel Innovation Authority also proclaimed the gap of FoodNxt, the fully-equipped innovation science laboratory for food-tech startups in Israel’s north.
“Israel being a ‘startup nation’ isn’t simply a commonplace,” says Yoni Glickman, President of Frutarom Natural Solutions same at the time. “Startups became the expansion engine of the food trade, and Frutarom, through FoodNxt, is functioning to accelerate this innovation – by providing power, processes, technologies, and experience to assist overcome challenges, nurture development, and launch new product into the world market.”
As a startup nation, the young entrepreneurs in Israel aren’t intimidated by issues and problems, Shoseyov same at the Gregorian calendar month event. The Israeli mentality teaches youngsters, together with young entrepreneurs within the food school trade, that failure could be a reality of life and simple to induce over, he explains. “They square measure able to jump in, therefore i feel this can be the correct place.”
Shoseyov, for his half, is creating his own “imprint” Israel’s food school innovation trade – virtually – with technology that may change the 3D printing of food to be used private homes, restaurants, schools, and establishments, consistent with the consumer’s predefined criteria. This groundbreaking school, developed last year aboard Ido Braslavsky, head of the Bachelors of Science program in organic chemistry and Food Science, is about to alter the approach we have a tendency to eat, what we have a tendency to eat, and the way we have a tendency to create our food.
Shoseyov incorporates nanocellulose, a tasteless plant-produced, zero-calorie, probiotic fiber into Chefit, his digital cook supported 3D printing technology. Chefit is what permits the user to customize a meal employing a 3D printer, equipped with cartridges of nanocellulose, protein, fat, and different ingredients, besides a “very targeted infrared head that you simply will bake, fry or grill,” he says.
While he’s already called one amongst the leading food 3D printing innovators in Israel, he’s additionally fast to imply that it’s additionally as a result of Israel as a rustic is kind of technologically savvy during this specific field.
“On the aspect of the technology that comes from 3D printers, Israel is certainly the leader,” he tells NoCamels, “We have several 3D printing corporations and a few of the most important in addition, therefore it’s very a hub. the fundamental power is here.”
Student displays
In the food development course at the Henry M. Robert H. Smith college of Agriculture, Food and setting, students specialize in topics adore raw materials and ingredients, why new product square measure developed, and new trends within the food trade. once they produce their food product, they face limitations, as they’d within the planet.
“The purpose of the category is scaling for production,” same Tammy Meiron, the Hebrew University academician teaching the course, “We offer students the tools to search out future product.”
This year, during a course 1st, students were asked to share their food school mixtures and creations at the conference. the scholars were split into 5 groups, assigned a food topic that required to be developed into a physical product, and collaborated with native food corporations and startups to return up with their formulations.
Students from the Terrabites cluster (l to r. Peleg Vareli, Hadas Wennstein, Esti Mirel, and Mor Maayan) cause with Jerusalem Venture Partners chairman and founder Erel Margalit. Courtesy
The Terrabites team was tasked with mistreatment the scraps of avocados, that square measure sometimes disposed of within the food trade.
The team’s goal was to isolate the fiber, therefore, it may well be extra into different product to extend the fiber content while not adding calories or unhealthy ingredients. Their 1st try resulted in massive fibrous items however when some tries, they terminated up with a refined powder that was straightforward to combine into different ingredients. Their final product was a gluten-free, all-natural energy bar, that was property. Avocado fiber augmented the bars fiber content from eight p.c to twenty p.c.
FOMO
This group’s challenge was to form a “clean label” delicacy. operating with Tnuva, the most important producer in Israel, that makes a specialty of milk and dairy farm product, they determined to form a coconut pudding with pineapple.
“Tapioca coconut are some things we have a tendency to don’t see within the food market,” student Li Ganor same. “We had coconut, cream, milk, tapioca, and vanilla sugar. we have a tendency to had to search out the simplest way to heat it and blend it in.”
The team learned there have been 2 ways that to solidify food product – by mixture and heating it – and that they had to experiment to induce the best magnitude relation of each while not having the food product pearls sink or split up. the scholars made a recent vegetarian course with natural ingredients. the toughest a part of the method, they said, was scaling it up for production, while not sacrificing the standard of the food product or the thickness of the bottom.
Moscatina
Insect larvae isn’t the perfect ingredient for frozen dessert, however a student cluster known as Moscatina managed to include it into a delicious frozen treat, with facilitate from Israeli startup Flying Spark, an organization that developed property and edible supermolecule powder from the larvae of Mediterranean fruit flies.
The cluster extra it to paste frozen dessert and berry sherbet, increasingthe supermolecule content from three.5 p.c to ten p.c for frozen dessert and from zero five|to five} p.c for sherbet.
You might be fooled by the palatability of this frozen dessert treat. It’s truly made up of the supermolecule powder of dipteron larvae! Courtesy
The students during this cluster were assigned to figure with a neighborhood Israeli spice plant. rather than going the plain route by creating spice kits for cookery, they selected to form cocktail mixtures which will be sold-out in packs. The cubes of cocktail mixtures square measure unbroken within the deep-freeze associated born into an alcoholic or non-alcoholic base liquid to remodel them directly into a replacement drink. The blends created by the cluster square measure all sugared with natural pear sweetening, not processed sugar.
Now here’s a Reese’s paste cup you won’t feel guilty regarding feeding. The Reesless team worked with Unavoo Food Technologies, an organization that created its own sweetener made up of all-natural ingredients with a glycemic worth of zero, no artificial or chemical ingredients, no sugar parts, and virtually no calories.

Diane Israel is a Chicago native and long-time supporter and advocate of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC). She is also famous for her culinary recipes. Diane can be reached at Diane@IsraelOnIsrael.com