There was a twist in the Science curriculum for Year 7 children at Malsis School, Cross Hills, near Skipton, when they ventured into the realms of creating new food flavours.
With the aim of helping to nurture a new generation of food scientists, this ad hoc addition to the school timetable evolved from a course called ‘Creating Savoury Flavours’, which was run by Skipton based Verner Wheelock Associates (VWA), a leading UK provider of food safety, nutrition and speciality courses and held in the school’s laboratory on three separate occasions.
The courses attracted delegates from all over the world and also fired the imagination of the school’s head of science, Richard Skillington.
“We wanted to give the pupils more experience of science outside the curriculum. They learnt about creating aromas and flavours for the food industry and worked in groups to create a winning formula for gravy flavouring. They started with a basic gravy mix and had to make three different flavours by using extra ingredients such as tomato, mushroom, beef and even orange.
“The children enjoyed it immensely especially when it came to tasting their own concoctions and choosing a favourite to be put forward for judging by the visiting ‘teachers”, said Mr Skillington.
The teachers, the same tutors who lead the VWA training, were two experts in their field, a food technologist, Richard Seal, who specialises in snack flavours and a flavour chemistry expert, Dr David Baines, who is the current president of the British Society of Flavourists.
“There is a shortage of food technology graduates coming into the food industry and we hope that we have inspired one or two of these youngsters to see that studying science – especially chemistry – can lead to an exciting career with food”, said Dr Baines.
The next ‘Creating Savoury Flavours’ course will take place on 12 – 16 April 2010. Contact Helen Moore on 01756 700802 for further details or email helen.moore@vwa.co.uk.
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