Microma, an ingredient biotech startup, is one of many companies endeavoring to make food coloring from natural ingredients to replace commonly used options like Red 40 and Yellow 5, which can “include synthetic, petroleum or animal-derived products.” Rejecting chemical colors, Microma is using precision fermentation to make colors using fungal ingredients. Their first product is Red+ (an alternative for Red 40) which has proven to …
Since 2008, Yanyun Zhao—a professor of food science at Oregon State University—has been researching the potential of the humble cranberry. Even when juiced, the crushed berry maintains a fibrous substance that Zhao turned into a film that’s “edible, no-waste, anti-microbial and water-soluble,” and could replace plastic in many cases. “When you’re making this film,” Zhao says, “You need stretch, you need elasticity, you need a …
“If you are conscious about it, what you eat is a political act. If you aren’t conscious about it, someone else’s politics have influenced what you are eating,” writes Corinne Mynatt in an essay that focuses on Daniel Fernández Pascual and Alon Schwabe’s Cooking Sections—specifically their CLIMAVORE project. Launched in 2015, CLIMAVORE delves into the ways that humans eat change climates. The project exists thanks …
