What are your favourite foods? Did you grow up liking Angel Delight, instant mash, prawn cocktail, chicken Kyiv, and Arctic rolls as the author did? The 1970s were once described as "the decade that good food forgot", but with hindsight, maybe they were the era when the push for profit, price, taste and convenience kick started a real interest in the food industry and how food affects us.
This book explores our extraordinary food journey over the past 3 million years and details the subsequent physical and cultural evolution that has transpired because of it. Food has not only fuelled our evolution for millions of years but has also dictated how we live, from hunter-gatherers to agricultural societies to our current urban and industrialised societies. It also details how our favourite foods have developed over the past millennia since the Neolithic revolution.
The 20th Century and the food production business saw the dawn of a new food era brought about by the Industrial Revolution. This was a world with an accelerated rate of change: population growth, industrialised agriculture, industrialised food production and environmental and sustainability concerns. The more recent development of the food industry has also coincided with a dramatic shift in consumer eating habits. What the world now eats and drinks has clashed with our biology to create significant changes in body composition. Whether these concerns are viewed from an economic, social, political or individual perspective, our present food model needs to change direction.
The final chapters discuss our current situation regarding food systems and individual health. They examine how a deeper understanding of our DNA, microbiome, genotypes and phenotypes could be integrated with rapid technological advancements and human ingenuity - a combination that has the potential to establish a far more sustainable and environmentally-friendly food system for both present and future.
Indisputably, food and its production matter to everyone on the planet as our history shows they always have!
Seamus Higgins began his career in the food industry as an electrical engineer and has worked with several leading international food companies, including Nestle and Premier Foods. Having completed an MBA programme in project management in the mid-nineties, he has since worked in several lead project and senior management roles, including factory development, food process engineering and new product development.
He has also performed and consulted for several leading global food and UK companies, entrepreneur development, and new company start-ups.
He joined the School of Chemical & Environmental Engineering, University of Nottingham, in 2017 as course director to develop a new MSc programme in food process engineering. His position as an associate professor for food process engineering at the University of Nottingham allows him to combine several years of food industry experience with departmental expertise in chemical and environmental sustainability endeavours.
He combines his passion for a more sustainable world and novel food manufacturing techniques with a new generation of process engineers at the University of Nottingham, supporting institutions and wider society. Seamus is an associate fellow of IChemE and a fellow of the Higher Education Authority UK. He is also an editorial board member of the International Journal for Food Process Engineering.
