Food Innovation Centre

Adamo Foods

Adamo Foods is a food tech start-up company that have developed natural, plant-based, whole cut meat alternatives to steak, using fungi. The company is aiming to launch products that avoid any unnecessary processing and are aiming for these alternatives to be healthy and clean label.  They are also working hard to achieve superior textures and high-quality flavours to gain a USP over other plant-based and meat alternatives.  For this reason, the company was interested to take a deep dive into the sensory attributes so important to this product category.

 

Image of plant based steak

From initial discussion to final delivery of the project the team at the FIC really listened and understood what we wanted. Jess produced a great piece of work that matched our expectations and will help drive forward our understanding of our material.


Gareth Payne - Adamo Foods

Adamo Foods (Spring 2024)

Project brief

  • Learn sensory methodology that can be implemented in their company to evaluate real beef steak and identify the most important sensory attributes to target their product development.
  • Learn how the company can set up their own sensory evaluation sessions with consumers to support their product development, by getting consumers to evaluate both competitor and their own products.  
  • Understand what they can do as a small company, in-house, rather than contracting out their work

The response

  • A report was written suggesting protocols for rapid methodology for qualitative descriptive analysis which has worked for other small companies.
  • A demonstration of the suggested rapid qualitative descriptive analysis was carried out in practice, with members of the company and the Food Innovation Centre forming the panel, to teach how to carry out the session in practice.  
  • A report was written suggesting protocols for consumer acceptability testing which will allow evaluation of samples in their own right, for degree of liking, as well as in a format where the scores can be compared with competitor product.  This incorporated a way of getting consumers to focus on the key sensory attributes for the category generated in the profiling session. 

Benefit to the business

The business gained new knowledge on how to conduct descriptive flavour profiling to map out key sensory attributes associated with Beef steak. Also, the company can use the qualitative and quantitative methodologies presented by the Food Innovation Centre to gain useful product insights, such as the sensory attributes that are most relevant to the consumers, to narrow down the focus areas for development. 

 

Adamo Foods (Autumn 2024)

Project brief

  • Characterise mycelium on a physicochemical and microstructural level, to include water holding capacity, porosity and density.
  • Identify methods to measure and analyse these characteristics, tailored for the unique Adamo product.
  • Recommend the most suitable methods, and identify which can be carried out at the University of Nottingham or in-house.

The response

  • A thorough literature review was conducted to identify the characteristics and behaviour of mycelium and similar high-moisture, high-porosity food materials.
  • Methods for analysing these food materials were evaluated, compared and most suitable methods suggested based on the characteristics of the unique Adamo product.
  • A plan of 'next steps' was created for the business, based on these recommendations.

Benefit to the business

The business gained insight into the variety of methods which can be used to characterise mycelium products, with tailored recommendations specific to their product. The plan of next steps enables the business to direct their future work, and using in-house or University of Nottingham capabilities reduces financial cost and work timelines.

 

 

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