Back to: Food and Nutrition SS 2
Salting
The salting or curing process removes moisture from the meat through an osmosis process. Meat is salted or cured with sugar, or a combination of the two. Nitrates and nitrites are also widely used to treat meat, leading to the distinctive pink colour and inhibiting Clostridium botulinum.
Crystallisation
Sugar is used to maintain fruits, either in fruit syrup such as apples, peaches, apricots, or in a crystallised form where the preserved material is cooked in sugar to the point of crystallisation and the resulting product is then stored in a dry place.
This method is used for citrus (candied peel), angelica, and ginger skins. An alteration of this process creates glacé fruit, such as glacé cherries, in which the fruit is preserved in sugar but then extracted from the syrup and sold, preserving the fruit sugar content and superficial syrup coating.
The use of sugar in brandy or other spirits is often combined with alcohol for preserving luxury products such as fruit. These should not be confused with spirits that are aromatised with fruit such as cherry brandy.
Smoking
Smoking is used to prolong the shelf-life of perishable food. This effect is achieved through the exposure of the food from burning plant materials such as wood to smoke. The meats and fish that have undergone curing are most commonly subjected to this method of food preservation.
Also smoked are fruits and vegetables such as paprika, cheeses, spices, and ingredients for making drinks such as malt and tea leaves, but mostly for cooking or flavouring. It is one of the oldest methods of food preservation which probably emerged after cooking with fire evolved.
Additives
Additives to the preservative foods can be antimicrobial. These inhibit bacterial or fungal growth, including mould or antioxidants, such as oxygen absorbers, which inhibit the oxidation of food components.
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