Works Cited:
Keryl Cryer. "How did they think of that?" The journey of vegetarian foods from idea to store shelves" (Online), Vegetarian Journal, March-April 2004, http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0FDE/is_2_23/ai_n6021648, April 18th, 2007.
Merriam-Webster. “Dictionary” (Online), http://reference.aol.com/dictionary?dword=vegetarianism&lookupbtn=Look+Up, April 21st, 2007.
References For Pictures:
¨ Morningstar Farms: http://community.morningstarfarms.com/home.aspx
¨ Boca Burgers: http://www.bocaburger.com/
¨ Veggie Shrimp and Chicken Legs: http://www.google.com/
Monday, April 23, 2007
Vegetarianism: It Looks Like Actual Meat!
Vegetarianism is “the theory or practice of living on a diet made up of vegetables, fruits, grains, nuts, and sometimes eggs or dairy products.” (Webster Dictionary)
A vegetarian’s main focus is to restrain from meat products in his or her diet. Some vegetarians eat dairy and/or egg products while others don’t. There are several types of vegetarians. Some include, lacto-vegetarians (eats dairy products), lacto-ovo-vegetarians (eats dairy and egg products), vegans (eats no meat, dairy, or egg products), macrobiotics (eats seafood), and fruitarians (eats fruits and vegetables). Some people also consider themselves as semi-vegetarians. They eat meat products from time to time.
Many vegetarians eat packaged items which are made from soy products. These items are often made to resemble actual meat products. One may inquire how the idea of creating these products started. “The first step in creating any new food product is for someone to come up with a concept for an item.” (“How did they think of that?”) This article explains how the idea of creating these vegetarian products started. Just as one would experiment with various combinations of objects when attempting to create something, when creating a recipe, or new vegetarian product in this case, one must conduct a test by mixing several things together to create the end product.
Perhaps the most popular brands of these products are Morningstar Farms and Boca Burgers. Craig Snow “was developing vegetarian products for ConAgra, which makes Healthy Choice and Banquet items. Craig became a Group Leader in the Product Development Division of the company, which was already distributing vegetarian products to mainstream supermarkets under the Morningstar Farms brand name.” (“How did they think of that?”) Craig, a vegan for twelve years now, plays a very important role in coming up with ideas for these products. He works together with his group to think of new ideas. “Concepts also come from other areas, such as marketing, sales, research, and consumer information. Together, the departments look at food trends and what their competition is producing.” (“How did they think of that?”)
One can see that a major factor of this whole process is competition. In supermarkets, these products take up only one little section of the freezer, if there’s any section at all. So, what do people think of these products? I conducted a survey in which I asked vegetarians as well as non-vegetarians what they think about these items. The ages of the people I surveyed ranged from twelve to fifty-four. Overall, I surveyed thirteen people. Seven people stated that they are vegetarians. Four are lacto-ovo vegetarians, while three are lacto-vegetarians. Only two of them are born vegetarians. When asked the question, why did you become a vegetarian?, the majority of them answered that the main reason is because of religion.
On the other hand, five people that I surveyed are not vegetarians and one person is semi-vegetarian. Some of them have never tried any of these products and some tried a few, like tofu and veggie burgers. Most of the people I surveyed felt that these vegetarian products are a great source of protein. Many of them said that the options of the products give vegetarians a variety of different items to choose from, and they are also great for beginner vegetarians because it helps them through the transition of being a meat eater to a vegetarian. However, some of the vegetarians that took the survey do not eat these products at all. A few of the non-vegetarians never heard of some of these items, such as the shrimp, chicken legs, lamb, etc.
Personally, I think these products are a wonderful source of protein. I became a vegetarian eight years ago for a few reasons. The main reason is because of my religion. Another reason is because I don’t think it is appropriate to hurt other living things, in this case, animals. One more reason is because my boyfriend is a Hindu priest and Hindu priests are encouraged to practice vegetarianism, so I chose to do this along with him. We are both lacto-ovo vegetarians and eat these products occasionally. I think when I first became a vegetarian in 1999, by eating some of these items, I was better able to make the change. While some of these products look and taste just like meat, I don’t think it’s always a case where a person is pretending to eat. I think it’s a form of encouraging the person in a way because it gives him or her more options to choose from, while still maintaining a healthy diet.
A vegetarian’s main focus is to restrain from meat products in his or her diet. Some vegetarians eat dairy and/or egg products while others don’t. There are several types of vegetarians. Some include, lacto-vegetarians (eats dairy products), lacto-ovo-vegetarians (eats dairy and egg products), vegans (eats no meat, dairy, or egg products), macrobiotics (eats seafood), and fruitarians (eats fruits and vegetables). Some people also consider themselves as semi-vegetarians. They eat meat products from time to time.
Many vegetarians eat packaged items which are made from soy products. These items are often made to resemble actual meat products. One may inquire how the idea of creating these products started. “The first step in creating any new food product is for someone to come up with a concept for an item.” (“How did they think of that?”) This article explains how the idea of creating these vegetarian products started. Just as one would experiment with various combinations of objects when attempting to create something, when creating a recipe, or new vegetarian product in this case, one must conduct a test by mixing several things together to create the end product.
Perhaps the most popular brands of these products are Morningstar Farms and Boca Burgers. Craig Snow “was developing vegetarian products for ConAgra, which makes Healthy Choice and Banquet items. Craig became a Group Leader in the Product Development Division of the company, which was already distributing vegetarian products to mainstream supermarkets under the Morningstar Farms brand name.” (“How did they think of that?”) Craig, a vegan for twelve years now, plays a very important role in coming up with ideas for these products. He works together with his group to think of new ideas. “Concepts also come from other areas, such as marketing, sales, research, and consumer information. Together, the departments look at food trends and what their competition is producing.” (“How did they think of that?”)
One can see that a major factor of this whole process is competition. In supermarkets, these products take up only one little section of the freezer, if there’s any section at all. So, what do people think of these products? I conducted a survey in which I asked vegetarians as well as non-vegetarians what they think about these items. The ages of the people I surveyed ranged from twelve to fifty-four. Overall, I surveyed thirteen people. Seven people stated that they are vegetarians. Four are lacto-ovo vegetarians, while three are lacto-vegetarians. Only two of them are born vegetarians. When asked the question, why did you become a vegetarian?, the majority of them answered that the main reason is because of religion.
On the other hand, five people that I surveyed are not vegetarians and one person is semi-vegetarian. Some of them have never tried any of these products and some tried a few, like tofu and veggie burgers. Most of the people I surveyed felt that these vegetarian products are a great source of protein. Many of them said that the options of the products give vegetarians a variety of different items to choose from, and they are also great for beginner vegetarians because it helps them through the transition of being a meat eater to a vegetarian. However, some of the vegetarians that took the survey do not eat these products at all. A few of the non-vegetarians never heard of some of these items, such as the shrimp, chicken legs, lamb, etc.
Personally, I think these products are a wonderful source of protein. I became a vegetarian eight years ago for a few reasons. The main reason is because of my religion. Another reason is because I don’t think it is appropriate to hurt other living things, in this case, animals. One more reason is because my boyfriend is a Hindu priest and Hindu priests are encouraged to practice vegetarianism, so I chose to do this along with him. We are both lacto-ovo vegetarians and eat these products occasionally. I think when I first became a vegetarian in 1999, by eating some of these items, I was better able to make the change. While some of these products look and taste just like meat, I don’t think it’s always a case where a person is pretending to eat. I think it’s a form of encouraging the person in a way because it gives him or her more options to choose from, while still maintaining a healthy diet.
Tuesday, April 17, 2007
Survey For Research Project
Name: _____________________ (Optional)
Age: _______
Gender: Male Female
Religion: ___________________________
1. Are you a vegetarian? Yes No
2. If yes, what type of a vegetarian are you?
-Lacto vegetarian (eats dairy products)
-Lacto-ovo vegetarian (eats dairy and egg products)
- Vegan (eats no meat, dairy, or egg products)
- Macrobiotic (eats seafood)
- Fruitarian (eats fruits and vegetables)
- Other ______________________________
3. How long have you been a vegetarian? __________________________
4. Why did you become a vegetarian? (Religion, Weight, Health, etc.)
______________________________________________________
______________________________________________________
5. How do you feel about the different vegetarian products that are being sold? (Vegetarian burgers, shrimp, chicken, lamb, fish, etc.)
______________________________________________________
______________________________________________________
______________________________________________________
______________________________________________________
6. Do you eat these products? If yes, which ones do you eat?
______________________________________________________
______________________________________________________
Age: _______
Gender: Male Female
Religion: ___________________________
1. Are you a vegetarian? Yes No
2. If yes, what type of a vegetarian are you?
-Lacto vegetarian (eats dairy products)
-Lacto-ovo vegetarian (eats dairy and egg products)
- Vegan (eats no meat, dairy, or egg products)
- Macrobiotic (eats seafood)
- Fruitarian (eats fruits and vegetables)
- Other ______________________________
3. How long have you been a vegetarian? __________________________
4. Why did you become a vegetarian? (Religion, Weight, Health, etc.)
______________________________________________________
______________________________________________________
5. How do you feel about the different vegetarian products that are being sold? (Vegetarian burgers, shrimp, chicken, lamb, fish, etc.)
______________________________________________________
______________________________________________________
______________________________________________________
______________________________________________________
6. Do you eat these products? If yes, which ones do you eat?
______________________________________________________
______________________________________________________
Shooting at Virginia Tech.
I think the tragedy that took place at Virginia Tech was a very sad event. It's amazing how people can take the innocent lives of others when we live in a society where people are fighting to survive every day. Thirty three people lost their lives and this incident became the deadliest shooting in all of the United States history. I think what makes this tragedy worse is that the gunman has been identified as a Virginia Tech student in at least the second of the two campus attacks. It leaves me to think, how can someone actually do that?
As I sat in Biology class this morning, my professor received a call from his brother in India. He called to make sure that everyone at St. John's is okay because he heard there was a shooting at a University. I immediately thought..wow...the news of this incident has become worldwide so quickly.
As I was reading the article, there were pictures and captions of Past School Shootings. I noticed that most of these shootings took place by teens, rather students as young as ages 11 and 13. I think the society is gradually becoming more and more corrupt. One reason is because of the media. Kids see these weapons like guns on television all of the time and it's only natural for some of them to want to have experiences with these things. Children, as well as adults, are very curious and everyone knows that when you tell a child not to do something, or he can't have something, he immediately tries to go against you because of curiosity. I think this tragedy has once again brought people together, as did the September 11 attacks, but neither of the incidents brought them together in a peaceful manner.
Shooting Tragedy at Virginia Tech
Gunman Identified as Virginia Tech Student
Bush, First Lady to Visit School for Convocation
By ADAM GELLER
AP
BLACKSBURG, Va. (April 17) -- Virginia Tech's president said Tuesday that a student was the gunman in at least the second of the two campus attacks that claimed 33 lives to become the deadliest shooting rampage in modern U.S. history.
Though he did not explicitly say the student was also the gunman in the first shooting, he said he did not believe there was another shooter at large. Two hours after two people were killed at a dormitory Monday, 30 more people were killed at a campus building by a gunman who finally killed himself with a shot to his head. "We do know that he was an Asian male -- this is the second incident -- an Asian man who was a resident in one of our dormitories," university president Charles Steger said in an interview with CNN, confirming for the first time that the killer was a student. Steger also defended the university's delay in warning students after the first shooting. Some students said their first notice came in an e-mail at 9:26 a.m., after the second shooting had begun. Steger said the university was trying to notify students who were already on-campus, not those who were commuting in.
“We warned the students that we thought were immediately impacted,” he told CNN. “We felt that confining them to the classroom was how to keep them safest.” He said investigators did not know there was a shooter loose on campus in the interval between the two shootings because the first could have been a murder-suicide. Two students told NBC's "Today" show they were unaware of the dorm shooting when they reported to a German class where the gunman later opened fire. Derek O'Dell, his arm in a cast after being shot, described a shooter who fired away in "eerily silence" with "no specific target -- just taking out anybody he could." After the gunman left the room, students could hear him shooting other people down the hall. O'Dell said he and other students barricaded the door so the shooter couldn't get back in _ though he later tried. "After he couldn't get the door open he tried shooting it open... but the gunshots were blunted by the door," O'Dell said.
The slayings left people of this once-peaceful mountain town and the university at its heart praying for the victims, struggling to find order in a tragedy of such unspeakable horror it defies reason. President Bush and first lady Laura Bush were planning to attend a 2 p.m. convocation Tuesday, and people sought comfort Monday night at a church servide. One mourner pleaded "for parents near and far who wonder at a time like this, 'Is my child safe?'" That question promises to haunt Blacksburg long after Monday's attacks. Investigators offered no motive, and the gunman's name was not released. The shooting began about 7:15 a.m. on the fourth floor of West Ambler Johnston, a high-rise coed dormitory where two people died. Police were still investigating around 9:15 a.m., when a gunman wielding two handguns and carrying multiple clips of ammunition stormed Norris Hall, a classroom building a half-mile away on the other side of the 2,600-acre campus. At least 15 people were hurt in the second attack, some seriously. Many found themselves trapped after someone, apparently the shooter, chained and locked Norris Hall doors from the inside.
Students jumped from windows, and students and faculty carried away some of the wounded without waiting for ambulances to arrive. SWAT team members with helmets, flak jackets and assault rifles swarmed over the campus. A student used his cell-phone camera to record the sound of bullets echoing through a stone building. Inside Norris, the attack began with a thunderous sound from Room 206 -- "what sounded like an enormous hammer," said Alec Calhoun, a 20-year-old junior who was in a solid mechanics lecture in a classroom next door. Screams followed an instant later, and the banging continued. When students realized the sounds were gunshots, Calhoun said, he started flipping over desks to make hiding places. Others dashed to the windows of the second-floor classroom, kicking out the screens and jumping from the ledge of Room 204, he said. "I must've been the eighth or ninth person who jumped, and I think I was the last," said Calhoun, of Waynesboro, Va. He landed in a bush and ran.
Calhoun said that the two students behind him were shot, but that he believed they survived. Just before he climbed out the window, Calhoun said, he turned to look at his professor, who had stayed behind, apparently to prevent the gunman from opening the door. The instructor was killed, Calhoun said. Erin Sheehan, who was in the German class next door to Calhoun's class, told the student newspaper, the Collegiate Times, that she was one of only four of about two dozen people in the class to walk out of the room. The rest were dead or wounded, she said. She said the gunman "was just a normal-looking kid, Asian, but he had on a Boy Scout-type outfit. He wore a tan button-up vest, and this black vest, maybe it was for ammo or something." The gunman first shot the professor in the head and then fired on the class, another student, Trey Perkins, told The Washington Post. The gunman was about 19 years old and had a "very serious but very calm look on his face," he said. "Everyone hit the floor at that moment," said Perkins, 20, of Yorktown, Va., a sophomore studying mechanical engineering. "And the shots seemed like it lasted forever." At an evening news conference, Police Chief Wendell Flinchum refused to dismiss the possibility that a co-conspirator or second shooter was involved. He said police had interviewed a male who was a "person of interest" in the dorm shooting and who knew one of the victims, but he declined to give details. "I'm not saying there's a gunman on the loose," Flinchum said. Ballistics tests will help explain what happened, he said. Some students bitterly complained that the first e-mail warning arrived more than two hours after the first shots. "I think the university has blood on their hands because of their lack of action after the first incident," said Billy Bason, 18, who lives on the seventh floor of the dorm. Steger emphasized that the university closed off the dorm after the first attack and decided to rely on e-mail and other electronic means to spread the word, but said that with 11,000 people driving onto campus first thing in the morning, it was difficult to get the word out. He said that before the e-mail was sent, the university began telephoning resident advisers in the dorms and sent people to knock on doors. Students were warned to stay inside and away from the windows. "We can only make decisions based on the information you had at the time. You don't have hours to reflect on it," Steger said. The 9:26 e-mail had few details: "A shooting incident occurred at West Amber Johnston earlier this morning. Police are on the scene and are investigating." Until Monday, the deadliest shooting in modern U.S. history was in Killeen, Texas, in 1991, when George Hennard plowed his pickup truck into a Luby's Cafeteria and shot 23 people to death, then himself. The massacre Monday took place almost eight years to the day after the Columbine High bloodbath near Littleton, Colo. On April 20, 1999, two teenagers killed 12 fellow students and a teacher before taking their own lives. Previously, the deadliest campus shooting in U.S. history was a rampage that took place in 1966 at the University of Texas at Austin, where Charles Whitman climbed the clock tower and opened fire with a rifle from the 28th-floor observation deck. He killed 16 people before he was shot to death by police. Founded in 1872, Virginia Tech is nestled in southwestern Virginia, about 160 miles west of Richmond. With more than 25,000 full-time students, it has the state's largest full-time student population. The school is best known for its engineering school and its powerhouse Hokies football team. Police said there had been bomb threats on campus over the past two weeks but that they had not determined whether they were linked to the shootings. It was second time in less than a year that the campus was closed because of gunfire. Last August, the opening day of classes was canceled when an escaped jail inmate allegedly killed a hospital guard off campus and fled to the Tech area. A sheriff's deputy was killed just off campus. The accused gunman, William Morva, faces capital murder charges. Among the dead were professors Liviu Librescu and Kevin Granata, said Ishwar K. Puri, the head of the engineering science and mechanics department. Librescu, an Israeli, was born in Romania and was known internationally for his research in aeronautical engineering, Puri wrote in an e-mail to The Associated Press. Granata and his students researched muscle and reflex response and robotics. Puri called him one of the top five biomechanics researchers in the country working on movement dynamics in cerebral palsy. Also killed was Ryan Clark, a student from Martinez, Ga., who had several majors and carried a 4.0 grade-point average, said Vernon Collins, coroner in Columbia County, Ga. His friend Gregory Walton, a 25-year-old who graduated last year, said he feared the nightmare had just begun. "I knew when the number was so large that I would know at least one person on that list," said Walton, a banquet manager. "I don't want to look at that list. I don't want to. "It's just, it's going to be horrible, and it's going to get worse before it gets better."
Bush, First Lady to Visit School for Convocation
By ADAM GELLER
AP
BLACKSBURG, Va. (April 17) -- Virginia Tech's president said Tuesday that a student was the gunman in at least the second of the two campus attacks that claimed 33 lives to become the deadliest shooting rampage in modern U.S. history.
Though he did not explicitly say the student was also the gunman in the first shooting, he said he did not believe there was another shooter at large. Two hours after two people were killed at a dormitory Monday, 30 more people were killed at a campus building by a gunman who finally killed himself with a shot to his head. "We do know that he was an Asian male -- this is the second incident -- an Asian man who was a resident in one of our dormitories," university president Charles Steger said in an interview with CNN, confirming for the first time that the killer was a student. Steger also defended the university's delay in warning students after the first shooting. Some students said their first notice came in an e-mail at 9:26 a.m., after the second shooting had begun. Steger said the university was trying to notify students who were already on-campus, not those who were commuting in.
“We warned the students that we thought were immediately impacted,” he told CNN. “We felt that confining them to the classroom was how to keep them safest.” He said investigators did not know there was a shooter loose on campus in the interval between the two shootings because the first could have been a murder-suicide. Two students told NBC's "Today" show they were unaware of the dorm shooting when they reported to a German class where the gunman later opened fire. Derek O'Dell, his arm in a cast after being shot, described a shooter who fired away in "eerily silence" with "no specific target -- just taking out anybody he could." After the gunman left the room, students could hear him shooting other people down the hall. O'Dell said he and other students barricaded the door so the shooter couldn't get back in _ though he later tried. "After he couldn't get the door open he tried shooting it open... but the gunshots were blunted by the door," O'Dell said.
The slayings left people of this once-peaceful mountain town and the university at its heart praying for the victims, struggling to find order in a tragedy of such unspeakable horror it defies reason. President Bush and first lady Laura Bush were planning to attend a 2 p.m. convocation Tuesday, and people sought comfort Monday night at a church servide. One mourner pleaded "for parents near and far who wonder at a time like this, 'Is my child safe?'" That question promises to haunt Blacksburg long after Monday's attacks. Investigators offered no motive, and the gunman's name was not released. The shooting began about 7:15 a.m. on the fourth floor of West Ambler Johnston, a high-rise coed dormitory where two people died. Police were still investigating around 9:15 a.m., when a gunman wielding two handguns and carrying multiple clips of ammunition stormed Norris Hall, a classroom building a half-mile away on the other side of the 2,600-acre campus. At least 15 people were hurt in the second attack, some seriously. Many found themselves trapped after someone, apparently the shooter, chained and locked Norris Hall doors from the inside.
Students jumped from windows, and students and faculty carried away some of the wounded without waiting for ambulances to arrive. SWAT team members with helmets, flak jackets and assault rifles swarmed over the campus. A student used his cell-phone camera to record the sound of bullets echoing through a stone building. Inside Norris, the attack began with a thunderous sound from Room 206 -- "what sounded like an enormous hammer," said Alec Calhoun, a 20-year-old junior who was in a solid mechanics lecture in a classroom next door. Screams followed an instant later, and the banging continued. When students realized the sounds were gunshots, Calhoun said, he started flipping over desks to make hiding places. Others dashed to the windows of the second-floor classroom, kicking out the screens and jumping from the ledge of Room 204, he said. "I must've been the eighth or ninth person who jumped, and I think I was the last," said Calhoun, of Waynesboro, Va. He landed in a bush and ran.
Calhoun said that the two students behind him were shot, but that he believed they survived. Just before he climbed out the window, Calhoun said, he turned to look at his professor, who had stayed behind, apparently to prevent the gunman from opening the door. The instructor was killed, Calhoun said. Erin Sheehan, who was in the German class next door to Calhoun's class, told the student newspaper, the Collegiate Times, that she was one of only four of about two dozen people in the class to walk out of the room. The rest were dead or wounded, she said. She said the gunman "was just a normal-looking kid, Asian, but he had on a Boy Scout-type outfit. He wore a tan button-up vest, and this black vest, maybe it was for ammo or something." The gunman first shot the professor in the head and then fired on the class, another student, Trey Perkins, told The Washington Post. The gunman was about 19 years old and had a "very serious but very calm look on his face," he said. "Everyone hit the floor at that moment," said Perkins, 20, of Yorktown, Va., a sophomore studying mechanical engineering. "And the shots seemed like it lasted forever." At an evening news conference, Police Chief Wendell Flinchum refused to dismiss the possibility that a co-conspirator or second shooter was involved. He said police had interviewed a male who was a "person of interest" in the dorm shooting and who knew one of the victims, but he declined to give details. "I'm not saying there's a gunman on the loose," Flinchum said. Ballistics tests will help explain what happened, he said. Some students bitterly complained that the first e-mail warning arrived more than two hours after the first shots. "I think the university has blood on their hands because of their lack of action after the first incident," said Billy Bason, 18, who lives on the seventh floor of the dorm. Steger emphasized that the university closed off the dorm after the first attack and decided to rely on e-mail and other electronic means to spread the word, but said that with 11,000 people driving onto campus first thing in the morning, it was difficult to get the word out. He said that before the e-mail was sent, the university began telephoning resident advisers in the dorms and sent people to knock on doors. Students were warned to stay inside and away from the windows. "We can only make decisions based on the information you had at the time. You don't have hours to reflect on it," Steger said. The 9:26 e-mail had few details: "A shooting incident occurred at West Amber Johnston earlier this morning. Police are on the scene and are investigating." Until Monday, the deadliest shooting in modern U.S. history was in Killeen, Texas, in 1991, when George Hennard plowed his pickup truck into a Luby's Cafeteria and shot 23 people to death, then himself. The massacre Monday took place almost eight years to the day after the Columbine High bloodbath near Littleton, Colo. On April 20, 1999, two teenagers killed 12 fellow students and a teacher before taking their own lives. Previously, the deadliest campus shooting in U.S. history was a rampage that took place in 1966 at the University of Texas at Austin, where Charles Whitman climbed the clock tower and opened fire with a rifle from the 28th-floor observation deck. He killed 16 people before he was shot to death by police. Founded in 1872, Virginia Tech is nestled in southwestern Virginia, about 160 miles west of Richmond. With more than 25,000 full-time students, it has the state's largest full-time student population. The school is best known for its engineering school and its powerhouse Hokies football team. Police said there had been bomb threats on campus over the past two weeks but that they had not determined whether they were linked to the shootings. It was second time in less than a year that the campus was closed because of gunfire. Last August, the opening day of classes was canceled when an escaped jail inmate allegedly killed a hospital guard off campus and fled to the Tech area. A sheriff's deputy was killed just off campus. The accused gunman, William Morva, faces capital murder charges. Among the dead were professors Liviu Librescu and Kevin Granata, said Ishwar K. Puri, the head of the engineering science and mechanics department. Librescu, an Israeli, was born in Romania and was known internationally for his research in aeronautical engineering, Puri wrote in an e-mail to The Associated Press. Granata and his students researched muscle and reflex response and robotics. Puri called him one of the top five biomechanics researchers in the country working on movement dynamics in cerebral palsy. Also killed was Ryan Clark, a student from Martinez, Ga., who had several majors and carried a 4.0 grade-point average, said Vernon Collins, coroner in Columbia County, Ga. His friend Gregory Walton, a 25-year-old who graduated last year, said he feared the nightmare had just begun. "I knew when the number was so large that I would know at least one person on that list," said Walton, a banquet manager. "I don't want to look at that list. I don't want to. "It's just, it's going to be horrible, and it's going to get worse before it gets better."
Article for Research Project
"How did they think of that?" The journey of vegetarian foods from idea to store shelves
Vegetarian Journal, March-April, 2004 by Keryl Cryer
DO YOU EVER FIND YOURSELF WONDERING how all those great vegetarian food items got into your local market? No, not who put them physically on the shelves or in the freezer cases, but who had the initial idea for that soysage? Or how did that company get those veggie burgers to look so much like their beef counterparts? How could someone create soy ice cream that tastes better than most dairy versions?
Each of these items started out as someone's idea, but whose? Who comes up with the recipes? How does a company decide to manufacture the result as a product? How do they know people will like it enough to buy it? These are just some of the questions that come up during a food item's journey from idea to ideal product.
Who Thinks of These Foods, Anyway?
The first step in creating any new food product is for someone to come up with a concept for an item. Since everyone eats, almost anyone could have a brainstorm about what they'd like to see at their next meal. Take Seth Tibbott, for example. The founder of Turtle Island Foods, which makes Tofurky[TM] products, was a teacher-naturalist who brought children into the field to educate them about ecology. His environmental background inspired him to become a vegetarian in 1970, and he was always looking for good protein sources. He had read about grain tempehs in cookbooks, but he hadn't seen such products in the United States at the time. Seth began to experiment with making tempeh at home for his own consumption and developed three unique varieties--a soy tempeh, a five-grain tempeh, and tempehroni, which was similar to an herbed soy sausage. By 1980, Seth had perfected the recipes and introduced them as what he believes were the first grain tempehs in the American market.
Other ideas come from people who work specifically with food manufacturers. Craig Snow, who has been a vegan for 12 years, graduated from the University of Missouri with a degree in Food Science. He was developing vegetarian products for ConAgra, which makes Healthy Choice and Banquet items, when he came upon an opportunity at Worthington Foods. Craig became a Group Leader in the Product Development Division of the company, which was already distributing vegetarian products to mainstream supermarkets under the Morningstar Farms brand name. Kellogg's bought Worthington out in 1999, and Craig now heads a group that formulates ideas for both the Worthington and Morningstar Farms labels, as well as for the Loma Linda and Natural Touch product lines.
As part of a large corporation, Craig and his team often brainstorm ideas among themselves. Concepts also come from other areas, such as marketing, sales, research, and consumer information. Together, the departments look at food trends and what their competition is producing. for instance, Morningstar Farms' Homestyle Chili & Cornbread Pot Pies were meant as an appealing alternative to similar products containing meat, both because they are vegan and because they contain significantly less fat than traditional pot pies.
Smaller operations usually don't have the luxury of such a large staff, but that doesn't mean they can't come up with something just as great. Matt Koch, the Founder and President of Road's End Organics, Inc., had graduated from Duke University in Computer Science and Economics when he created a dairy-free, cheese-like sauce for pizzas, calzones, and steamed vegetables he made at home. He still experiments and uses his own taste buds to see if a food item could have potential.
"Now, we approach the creation of new products mostly in-house by being creative at lunch time," Matt said. "Although we do use a former Ben & Jerry's food technologist for some of our product development and more technical questions, our new vegan, organic, gluten-free gravy mix was stumbled upon in the factory. Our production manager was attempting to make some gravy for a noodle and seitan meal, when we realized that we had many of the ingredients and all of the same manufacturing capabilities that it would take to make a gravy mix under the Road's End label."
The Production Process
When Road's End decided to pursue their new gravy mixes, the staff began with a simple recipe, then worked to perfect it. "We quickly threw together a version with soy sauce, veggie broth, flour, nutritional yeast, garlic, salt, etc.," Matt said, "and after tasting it, we knew we were on to something ... but the product was still a long way off. The next step was replacing the soy sauce with a powdered version. After much searching we found an organic, gluten-free tamari powder for our mix that is delicious and 'clean.' We then tried many blends of yeast, herbs, and different flours, until we settled on ingredients that gave us the best flavor, color, and texture."
A company like Morningstar Farms works in a similar fashion but on a much grander scale. First, they make a consumer concept statement, which describes the product's features and lists the flavors and ingredients needed to create it. Then, Craig's team physically makes the food in the product development labs on a small scale. If the item works, they will proceed to a miniature version of a real plant called a pilot plant to see that the item can be manufactured in a way that can duplicate the taste and texture within the cost parameters.
Vegetarian Journal, March-April, 2004 by Keryl Cryer
DO YOU EVER FIND YOURSELF WONDERING how all those great vegetarian food items got into your local market? No, not who put them physically on the shelves or in the freezer cases, but who had the initial idea for that soysage? Or how did that company get those veggie burgers to look so much like their beef counterparts? How could someone create soy ice cream that tastes better than most dairy versions?
Each of these items started out as someone's idea, but whose? Who comes up with the recipes? How does a company decide to manufacture the result as a product? How do they know people will like it enough to buy it? These are just some of the questions that come up during a food item's journey from idea to ideal product.
Who Thinks of These Foods, Anyway?
The first step in creating any new food product is for someone to come up with a concept for an item. Since everyone eats, almost anyone could have a brainstorm about what they'd like to see at their next meal. Take Seth Tibbott, for example. The founder of Turtle Island Foods, which makes Tofurky[TM] products, was a teacher-naturalist who brought children into the field to educate them about ecology. His environmental background inspired him to become a vegetarian in 1970, and he was always looking for good protein sources. He had read about grain tempehs in cookbooks, but he hadn't seen such products in the United States at the time. Seth began to experiment with making tempeh at home for his own consumption and developed three unique varieties--a soy tempeh, a five-grain tempeh, and tempehroni, which was similar to an herbed soy sausage. By 1980, Seth had perfected the recipes and introduced them as what he believes were the first grain tempehs in the American market.
Other ideas come from people who work specifically with food manufacturers. Craig Snow, who has been a vegan for 12 years, graduated from the University of Missouri with a degree in Food Science. He was developing vegetarian products for ConAgra, which makes Healthy Choice and Banquet items, when he came upon an opportunity at Worthington Foods. Craig became a Group Leader in the Product Development Division of the company, which was already distributing vegetarian products to mainstream supermarkets under the Morningstar Farms brand name. Kellogg's bought Worthington out in 1999, and Craig now heads a group that formulates ideas for both the Worthington and Morningstar Farms labels, as well as for the Loma Linda and Natural Touch product lines.
As part of a large corporation, Craig and his team often brainstorm ideas among themselves. Concepts also come from other areas, such as marketing, sales, research, and consumer information. Together, the departments look at food trends and what their competition is producing. for instance, Morningstar Farms' Homestyle Chili & Cornbread Pot Pies were meant as an appealing alternative to similar products containing meat, both because they are vegan and because they contain significantly less fat than traditional pot pies.
Smaller operations usually don't have the luxury of such a large staff, but that doesn't mean they can't come up with something just as great. Matt Koch, the Founder and President of Road's End Organics, Inc., had graduated from Duke University in Computer Science and Economics when he created a dairy-free, cheese-like sauce for pizzas, calzones, and steamed vegetables he made at home. He still experiments and uses his own taste buds to see if a food item could have potential.
"Now, we approach the creation of new products mostly in-house by being creative at lunch time," Matt said. "Although we do use a former Ben & Jerry's food technologist for some of our product development and more technical questions, our new vegan, organic, gluten-free gravy mix was stumbled upon in the factory. Our production manager was attempting to make some gravy for a noodle and seitan meal, when we realized that we had many of the ingredients and all of the same manufacturing capabilities that it would take to make a gravy mix under the Road's End label."
The Production Process
When Road's End decided to pursue their new gravy mixes, the staff began with a simple recipe, then worked to perfect it. "We quickly threw together a version with soy sauce, veggie broth, flour, nutritional yeast, garlic, salt, etc.," Matt said, "and after tasting it, we knew we were on to something ... but the product was still a long way off. The next step was replacing the soy sauce with a powdered version. After much searching we found an organic, gluten-free tamari powder for our mix that is delicious and 'clean.' We then tried many blends of yeast, herbs, and different flours, until we settled on ingredients that gave us the best flavor, color, and texture."
A company like Morningstar Farms works in a similar fashion but on a much grander scale. First, they make a consumer concept statement, which describes the product's features and lists the flavors and ingredients needed to create it. Then, Craig's team physically makes the food in the product development labs on a small scale. If the item works, they will proceed to a miniature version of a real plant called a pilot plant to see that the item can be manufactured in a way that can duplicate the taste and texture within the cost parameters.
Monday, April 16, 2007
Monday, April 09, 2007
My 19th Birthday.
On Sunday, April 1st, 2007, I celebrated my 19th birthday by having an evening of singing at my Temple in South Ozone Park, Queens. Most of the preparations began Saturday night (March 31st) and lasted throughout the morning of April 1st. On Saturday night, my cousins and aunts came over to my house to help us prepare various food items for the celebration. My brother, along with three of my cousins and nephew, rehearsed a few songs to sing at the program. They ended up leaving my house at 11:45pm that night. The next day, I went to Temple in the morning for the service. The program began at 4pm and lasted until 8pm. There were many people there (around 300) and there were many talented musicians. Most of the items were presented by students and teachers my Music School. There were also a few items presented from members of Temple, and some family members.
In the end, my cousin brought a huge cake to the front where I was sitting and every one sang Happy Birthday to me. They also made me dance at the end of the program. Overall, it was a great evening.
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