Tip Tuesday: Butter or Margarine?

When you are given a choice between butter or margarine, what would be your preference? Well, first of all you should know what butter and margarine actually are.

Butter is made from animal fat (cow’s milk or cream). It contains at least 80% of milk fat. There are several types of butter on the shelf, which can generally be categorized into two, high in saturated fat (denoted by the terms such as “original”, “rich”, and “cultured”), and low in saturated fat (indicated by the words “whipped”, “light”, or “vegetable oil blend”). The intake of too much saturated fat has a negative impact on cardiovascular health.

On the other hand, margarine is made from vegetable oils. In the old days, the industry hydrogenated the oils to turn it into solid form. The hydrogenation process converts the unsaturated fatty acids in the oil into trans fatty acids. It is well-studied that trans fat acids have detrimental effect on health when regularly consumed.

Fortunately, there is a new method known as ‘inter-esterification’ to replace the conventional hydrogenation nowadays. Inter-esterification employs enzymes to do the work, which does not produce the harmful trans fatty acids. You can differentiate margarines by checking the ingredient list on the label. The combination of “no trans fatty acids” and “partially hydrogenated oil”, or the absence of the word “hydrogenated”, shows that the margarine is made by inter-esterification. Anyhow, the margarines sold in Finland contain very little to none of these trans fatty acids, here is the link to the official news release: http://www.evira.fi/portal//en/frontpage/frontpage+news/?bid=1824.

So how do you make a choice between butter and margarine? The former has a stronger aroma and made from a natural source, whereas the latter sounds healthier but is a processed food. It is strongly recommended to opt for the product with least saturated fat and zero trans fat.

 

The information provided here is served as a general guideline.

Nutritionist of The Froodly Team,

Wan Lih Ching

Tip Tuesday: How do I Handle my Fruits Properly?

Fruits are essential in our diet. But how can you maintain their freshness for a few days longer?

During ripening, some fruits release ethylene (C2H2), which is a gas that accelerates the ripening process – i.e. change in colour and the development of characteristic flavour/taste. Examples of such fruits are avocados, bananas, honeydew melons, kiwis, mangoes, pears and tomatoes. Ethylene is used commercially to ripen the fruits (and vegetables) postharvest. Therefore, if you wish to store your fruits and vegetables longer, you should store them separately. Otherwise, they will spoil prematurely and rapidly.

As you know, fruits are full of nutrients and contain high amount of water. It is a favourable environment for microbes to grow, so you should handle fruits with care because pinching or squeezing may bruise them. This will increase the likelihood of enzymatic browning or invasion of microbes and cause spoilage. In general, fruits with increased softness and unpleasant odour are the signs of enzymatic browning. Although enzymatic browning is not harmful to health, there is a risk of yeast spoilage too. You should probably throw them away when they turn too mushy and have a ‘grayish’ appearance.

As a conclusion, remember to store ethylene-producing fruits separately from other fruits and vegetables. Handle them with extra care and try not to keep them for too long because microbes may ‘eat’ them before you do!

 

The information provided here is served as a general guideline.

Nutritionist of The Froodly Team

Wan Lih Ching

Tip Tuesday: Hmm… is there mold on my bread?

Bread is so common everywhere in the world. It’s a versatile food, for example by applying spreads or jams, serving with cheese or salami, or even eat it as it is.

Oh no! The loaf of bread that I bought is ‘expiring’ tomorrow! Which one do you normally do?

– Finish them off as my lunch, tea break, dinner and supper.

– Eat it as usual the next day but worry about getting food poisoning.

– Throw it away because, yucks, there will be mold growing on it the next day!

– Put it in the refrigerator or freezer (it will become stale, dry and harder though).

As a matter of fact, if you do not place the bread near the sink, moisten the bread and leave it exposed, or place it at a warm and dark place, commercial bread can be safely eaten few days after the sell-by date showed on the tag (although it might get stale). This is because there are preservatives in it to prevent mold growth. Well, don’t be afraid to eat bread! The preservatives added in such small quantities so that are certainly harmless to our health, but with enough to suppress microbial growth.

On the other hand, if it smells sour or funky, and there are tiny greenish/ grayish/ blackish/ whitish spots on the surface like this:

it may be fine when accidentally ingested (oops!) a small amount of mold, but certain types of mold can cause food poisoning. So you should definitely wrap the bread up (to avoid spreading of mold spores to the surrounding) and throw it away.

The information provided here is served as a general guideline.

Nutritionist of The Froodly Team,

Wan Lih Ching

Tip Tuesday: How long is my ground beef safe to eat?

With 5 euros or less, you can get a kilogram of ground meat, which is quick and easy to prepare. Sometimes a packet of 400 grams ground meat can last for 10 meals, which may already have passed the date stated on its package. So you would wonder, should I use it or should I throw it away?

Well, like dairy products, the date stated on the package very often is the ‘sell-by’ date. If the package of ground meat is opened and the balance is transferred into a tightly-closed container and refrigerated at all times, then it can still remain safe to use for 1 to 3 days after the sell-by date. It is similar in the case of unopened ground meat.

The shelf life of ground meat can be further extended if it is frozen. Theoretically, foods that are freshly frozen can last indefinitely. This is because water that’s present in the ground meat is not available for microbial use, therefore the microbes hardly grow in it to cause spoilage to the food. However, the freezing time plays an important role in determining the actual shelf life. Unopened ground meat will generally stay good for a few months in the freezer when the package is overwrapped with a plastic wrap and then stored in the freezer before reaching the sell-by date. Alternatively, you can cook the ground meat and then store it in the freezer, which could also last for a month.

A general rule of thumb is that ground meat can still be used for a few days after the sell-by date if it is properly stored. But you should discard any ground meat with a sour smell, slimy texture or off-color (example as seen in the image below).

Tip Tuesday: Are my dairy products still safe to consume?

Speaking about dairy, what comes to your mind? Milk? Cheese? Yogurt? Exactly! Not only those, piimä (cultured milk), ice cream, butter, sherbet, and many other desserts are also dairy-based products.

Many of us think that the date printed on the dairy products is an expiration date. Well, they are not, instead they are usually a ‘sell-by’ date. Therefore, fresh dairy products, eg. pasteurized milk, are in fact safe to be consumed up to one week after the ‘sell-by’ date, with the condition that the product is STORED PROPERLY at all times i.e. refrigerate as soon as possible after purchasing them, cover the opened product nicely after each use and refrigerate promptly. Despite being safe to consume, nutrient content (for example, vitamin C is gradually oxidized over time) and the amount of probiotics (in case of yogurt, for instance) are lower than the values labeled on the container.

But how do you tell whether it has gone bad? Can you tell which one looks like a spoiled milk in the picture below?

Yes, the answer is: the picture on the left. Common traits of spoiled dairy products are distinctive sour smell, off-color, and lumpy texture. All these are the result of fermentation by various lactic acid bacteria. They are no longer safe to be consumed because you may end up getting diarrhea or even worse!

In a nut shell, dairy products are generally safe to be consumed when they had passed the ‘sell-by’ date but are stored properly at all times. So don’t hesitate to buy a yogurt that has today’s date printed on its label!

The information provided here is served as a general guideline.

Nutritionist of The Froodly Team

Wan Lih Ching

 

Froodly’s looking for a marketing communications intern!

Froodly is looking for a marketing communications intern!

We’re looking to bring an intern in to our team to help us out with content creation for both online and offline communications, analysis of marketing data, and English-Finnish translation of materials. You will have a great opportunity to learn on the fly in the fast-paced start-up environment, and have the chance to learn a greater variety of skills in this smaller team start-up.

Applicants must be Finnish and based in Helsinki. Please send applications to brennan@froodly.com.

Join Froodly’s 30 + 20% Week at K-Supermarket Kaisaniemi!

2015 is coming to an end and Froodly wants to thank you all for your activeness and support, and we want to get to know you and reward your efforts to reduce food waste!

Before you are head off for the holidays, come drop by K-Supermarket Kaisaniemi this week and say hi to us and receive extra discounts! From Monday to Friday (December 7^th-11^th) you will find the Froodly team at the K-Supermarket Kaisaniemi from 10:00-18:00.  Tell us about your experiences with Froodly and you will get a discount coupon for food! Extra 20% on top of the regular 30% and it is valid till the end of 2015.

Bring your friends along! See you there!

Froodly’s Ravintolapäivä Food Rescue Campaign Will Now Be On Facebook!

As you may know, we at Froodly are looking to have as big of an impact on Ravintolapäivä’s food waste as possible, and are looking to include as many restaurant owners and foodies as we can! We have decided that the best way to do this was to make a Facebook group instead of including a Ravintolapäivä section in our app. We want to allow everyone to participate, instead of just those on one or two mobile platforms, and therefore thought that the Facebook group would be our best approach!

The Facebook group will have the same idea as the app: Restaurant owners can post pictures of their food that they might want to sell for a discount to ensure that it all finds hungry tummies!

If you’d like to submit your restaurant you can either email Brennan at brennan@froodly.com to get it set up, or create an album yourself for your restaurant in the Facebook group! Anyone who’s looking to find the best around Helsinki can check out all of the deals through the Facebook group as well!

You can find the Facebook group here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1717358661826550/

We hope your enjoy the day, and please email us if you have any questions!

The Froodly Team

 

Froodly’s back and even bigger for this Saturday’s Ravintolapäivä!

Our actions during last Ravintolapäivä helped 21 cooks and saved 200 kgs of food from being thrown away. However, we’re aiming to make an even bigger impact this time around by allowing all cooks around the Helsinki area to participate with us in fighting for this cause. Froodly invites all foodies in Helsinki to join us this Saturday (November 21^st) as we continue to push towards a waste-free Ravintolapäivä.

This Saturday, Froodly is going to launch a special section in our app for Ravintolapäivä. In order to prevent food waste, individual restaurant owners can notify other foodies about their discounted dishes through Froodly’s app. Whenever a restaurant owner has food that they need to sell, these cooks can list their products on Froodly’s app for the discount that the cook chooses, so that people can find their restaurants and save these products. Good food should go to tummies, not to bins. We’re excited to see all of the great restaurants taking part, and are excited to help cooks and foodies alike to make sure that all this great food is eaten!

Froodly (food-friendly) foodies are food heroes. Join the community and make an impact with a swipe. An exciting week is ahead, because on top of our Ravintolapäivä section, we will also be releasing the Android Version of Froodly this week!

If you’d like to include your restaurant in Froodly’s app for Ravintolapäivä please send your restaurant name and location to brennan@froodly.com, or any questions you may have!  Download Froodly’s iOS here, and we will keep you updated once we release the Froodly Android application!

Froodly’s food waste app will be helping cooks and foodies in Helsinki this Saturday. Image: apenmatkat.blogspot.com

 

Froodly and Rhea’s Food Waste Panel Discussion: Key Takeaways

Our first collaborative event, a panel discussion on food waste with Rhea Solutions, was held successfully on October 26^th. This discussion was part of the program of Development Cooperation Week of University of Helsinki.

According to the Natural Resources Institute Finland (MTT), about 400 million kilos of food are wasted in the food production chain annually in Finland. How much and heavy is this? Too many zeroes to imagine?

In order to raise public awareness of this matter, we invited guests from different industries to talk about the situation. We were honoured to have well-known Chef Sami Garamin, green politician Sirpa Hertellin from the City of Espoo, representative of Shared Table (Yhteisen pöydän) Hanna Kuisma, Planning Manager of S-Group Mika Lyytikäinen and Research Scientist Kirsi Silvennoinen as our panellists. Sini Suomalainen from Rhea Solutions was the moderator on the day.

On the present food waste phenomenon

Our guests participated actively in the discussion. Silvennoinen provided concrete data of the ongoing problem in Finland, which acted as a foundation for the whole panel discussion. All other speakers were well-aware of the situation and expressed their opinions enthusiastically.

Lyytikäinen, despite his high-ranked position, often shops for expiring discounted products from supermarkets. He does not see buying 30% off products embarrassing at all, and in fact welcomes it. Moreover, he pointed out that shopping local produce is one step towards reducing food waste. Perishables goods decay easily during transport.

Food expiration labels that are used for protecting our well-being can sometimes be obstacles. Shared Table is a warehouse which collects edible goods from shops then provides storage and delivery services to the needy. Kusima remarked the strict application of used-by labels renders food waste. If there is a large time lapse between delivery from shops and to other organisations, products with use-by labels may have to be thrown away.

Instead of examining food by date numbers, Garam voiced the importance of using our five senses, which eventually leads to food appreciation. Besides having numerous ideas for transforming ‘old’ food, he was also keen on food-saving ideas taking place in other European countries. For instance, fridge sharing in a community so that one individual’s uneaten food can be another person’s dinner.

There is a flip side of the generous act of offering buffet lunch at schools and other public institutions. Due to the difficulty of estimating people’s appetite, there is always a surplus of food produced. In other words, leftovers go straight to the bin. Hertell sees the potential of selling leftovers as affordable products. Yet, public regulations hinder the food saving process.

Social responsibility is the key

We all have heard of this food waste problem before, but 2015 is the action year. France bans supermarket food waste by law. Denmark has reduced food waste 25% in 5 years, and takes initiative to reduce 25% of their food waste nationwide by 2020. The United States set their first food waste reduction goal, aiming to cut food waste 50% by 2030. How about Finland? Someone queues for free bread for hours and some throw it away. In order to make Finland more environmental-friendly and cost-efficient, more attention on handling the food waste problem is needed from officials.

Although there are flaws in the Finnish public system, we should not solely rely on the government to reduce food waste. Everyone in society has responsibility to treat food in a better manner. Remember one third of the food waste is contributed by households? Start something small like checking your fridge before grocery shopping. Everybody’s action matters.

It’s time to be creative and mindful with food. Be Froodly (food + friendly).

Froodly and Rhea’s Food Waste Panel Discussion was held on October 26th.
Photo Credit: Development Cooperation Week of the University of Helsinki