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Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

food waste

Google Doubles Down on Food Waste Reduction, Gives $1 Million to ReFED’s Catalytic Grant Fund 

While Google has long focused on making sure they run their kitchens efficiently and minimize food waste, the pause on food service brought on by the pandemic gave the tech giant a chance to step back and evaluate how they could do an even better job.

Now, with workers heading back to the office, Google plans to double down on food waste reduction. In a new initiative announced yesterday in a blog post by Google’s VP of Workplace Programs, Michiel Bakker, Google will aim to cut food waste in half for each employee and send zero food waste to the landfill. The effort will achieve its aims through an increased focus on food sourcing and procurement, improved monitoring in the company’s kitchens and cafes, and ensuring food is repurposed or disposed of properly.

The new initiative builds up efforts by Google to fine-tune their kitchens using cutting-edge technology. At the end of 2020, the company took an initiative that had been in development in its moonshot factory called Project Delta, which had helped grocers like Kroger reduce food waste and started rolling it out to its kitchens across Alphabet. The company also uses machine vision technology from Leanpath to help their chefs monitor where food is going and how much is going to waste.

While it’s easy to think a company like Google relies solely on high-tech approaches to reduce food waste, efforts over the past two years have relied on a variety of creative approaches ranging from engineering employee behavior changes to rethinking the company’s food systems.

In an interview with Fast Company, the head of Google’s Food for Good program, Emily Ma, describes one example of how the company looked at ways to prompt behavior changes in Google employees through simple nudges.

“Even the size of the scoop you get makes a difference,” Ma says. In a few cafes, the company serves plated meals, so cafe staff can control portions, but that isn’t a viable option everywhere, she says. At a buffet, shrinking the size of plates or bowls helps since people otherwise often end up taking more than they actually want to eat. Simple signs reminding people to just take what they need—and that they can always come back for more—can also help.

The company is also working to change its meal recipes to use more upcycled food and is working to create more circular food systems within Google. In one program, the company has been testing feeding food scraps to black soldier flies, which are then fed to chickens which lay eggs that Google buys back.

Finally, Google is working with other organizations to help push the industry towards more data-driven solutions to end food waste. As part of the new effort, Google has donated $1 million to ReFED as an anchor funder for the food waste reduction organization’s new Catalytic Grant Fund, a five-year initiative to distribute $10 million in recoverable and non-recoverable grants to organizations working on initiatives across the food waste prevention.

“We aim to drive technology, process, policy and infrastructure innovation where it is most needed, because we know the biggest impact will come when the entire industry is empowered to keep food from going to waste,” said Ma in the announcement made with ReFED.

Food Waste Innovators Wanted

If we could pick one thing in the entire food space that technology could truly solve, it would be food *waste.* It has always been an issue that has a ripple effect up and down the food chain, and the statistics have only gotten worse since the COVID-19 pandemic began in 2020.

The team at the food waste non-profit ReFED works daily to provide data-driven solutions to reduce waste and loss in the food system — and that work is the topic at the 2022 Food Waste Solutions Summit held this year on May 10-12 in Minneapolis, MN.

Food waste doesn’t just happen at the consumer level, though about one-third of the 1.4 billion tons of waste happens after the food has been placed on retail shelves or taken home to consumer kitchens. But food waste – or food loss, as some experts note – also happens earlier in the supply chain, either during manufacturing, transportation and at the very beginning at the agricultural level.

Part of the Food Waste Solutions Summit is to discover and discuss innovations designed to tackle food waste at all levels of the food chain. The Spoon has partnered with ReFED to host a session showcasing innovative technology solutions to reduce food waste, specifically in agriculture, supply chain, and consumer categories — and we’re on the hunt for the creators, entrepreneurs and problem-solvers innovating in those categories to come and tell us their story.

Applications to speak during this innovation showcase are open through Friday, March 4. If you lead any organization innovating in the above-named categories, fill out the quick application. If selected, speakers will be included in a brief “fireside chat”-style conversation with the session moderator and audience Q&A. 

We’re looking forward to meeting and hearing from food businesses, funders, policymakers, entrepreneurs and non-profits all working to solve this complex, global issue. For more info on the 2022 Food Waste Solutions Summit hosted by ReFED, visit their site.

*Note: The Spoon is a media partner for this event; this post is not part of any paid campaign.*

CES: Tackling Food Waste With Technology (Video)

The topic of food waste and innovation is so important — in the US alone, $408 billion worth of food is wasted each year. But the topic is too often overlooked when it comes to food tech conversations.

That’s why we invited experts to join us at the CES Food Tech Conference last month to talk about waste at different points in the food supply chain as well as the systemic issues plaguing the global food system.

We welcomed Vonnie Estes, Vice President of Innovation with the International Fresh Produce Association to moderate this panel with participants including Spencer Martin, CEO of Clew, Adian Mouat, Co-Founder & CEO of Hazel Technologies and Tim West, President of True West Ventures LLC.

The full panel — “Tackling Food Waste With Technology” is ready for viewing below.

CES 2022: Hazel Technologies Wants to Extend The Life of Perishable Food

Food waste startup Hazel Technologies started by creating solutions that could integrate into the existing global food chain by taking aim at food packages. In a sit down interview at CES 2022, CEO Aidan Mouat explained the way they think about their solution the way you would with a traditional tech stack. “Hazel is creating a chemical stack where our technology acts as the biochemistry layer to existing food packaging. The inserts are activated using atmospheric chemistry to control certain parameters in perishable food shelf life during storage and transit,” he added.

Today, Hazel Technologies are also working on the supply side, tracking as perishables get from distributors and farms to the grocery shelf. They’re also collecting data, looking at logistics and partnering with larger brands to optimize their own packaging and shipping procedures.

Food waste is clearly going to be a big part of the conversation in the world of food and tech this year. We’re not only seeing hardware and software innovation from food and kitchen companies but in biochemical innovation in places like packaging to keep food edible and safe longer.

Don’t miss this conversation on sustainable packaging tech and the impact on waste with The Spoon’s Mike Wolf and Hazel Technologies’ CEO Aidan Mouat at CES 2022.

CES 2022: The Spoon Interviews Hazel Technologies' Aidan Mouat.

Investor Look: 10 Trends to Watch in Ag + Food Tech in 2022

Food, ocean and agtech venture fund S2G Ventures released a report citing ten catalysts that will shape intersecting industries including agriculture, food manufacturing, nutrition and food retail in 2022. The report examines the trends that are driving the transition to a climate-smart, healthy food system.

S2G — investor in several food and agtech startups — looks at technology disruption in three major categories including agricultural innovation, supply chain disruption and personalized food and nutrition.

“The food transition is still in its infancy but is being propelled by seismic tailwinds: massive demographic change spurring new consumer demand, significant advancements in the biology, chemistry and physics of food production to create new choices and now capital markets anchored by ESG that want to fund high growth, disruptive companies,” commented Sanjeev Krishnan, S2G Ventures Managing Director and Chief Investment Officer.

Farmers in the US are facing new challenges every day from nutrient-challenged soil to lack of access to capital. The S2G report describes the ways that innovation in fintech, robotics and biotech along with an increase in socially and environmentally conscious investing (ESG) will lead to the “fourth industrial revolution” in farms across the country.

The drivers of innovation in farming include:

  • Robots will increase efficiency while reducing labor needs across the food system.
  • The rise of ESG will help to digitize the farm.
  • Fintech will transform opportunities in agriculture, just as it did for the student loan and mortgage markets.
  • RNA technology that saved lives during Covid-19 will be applied to farms to save soils.

Supply chain disruptions experienced over the past two years have catalyzed both governmental institutions NGOs and the private sectors to fund and drive innovation in biotech, cellular agriculture and food waste solutions. The result according to S2G Ventures will be supply chains that are more nimble, sustainable, localized and less wasteful.

Innovations that will revolutionize supply chains include:

  • Fermentation will power the next generation of alternative protein products.
  • Cellular protein will provide consumers around the world with safe, sustainable food.
  • Adoption of food waste solutions will be recognized as both a good business practice and an essential tool for feeding the world.

Even prior to the pandemic, consumers were demonstrating a desire for better food choices and a renewed focus on ways to personalize their nutrition and healthcare. To answer this demand, food and nutrition startups are using cutting-edge bio and food science as well as AI and machine learning to develop nutrient-dense, functional and personalized food products.

Personalized food & nutrition catalysts include:

  • AI and machine learning platforms will unlock greater understanding of and use cases for plants and fungi.
  • Food will become central to the effort to prevent chronic disease and improve health outcomes.
  • Food brands and grocers will have to “personalize or perish.”

To dig into more details on areas to watch in food and agtech this year, download the full report from S2G Ventures.

CES 2022: Uvera’s Smart Food Storage Uses UVC Light To Kill Bacteria

If you’re like me, no matter how hard you try, you end up throwing out food.

And while I recognize most of that waste is on me – a huge part of reducing food waste, after all, is being more mindful about how much is made and remembering to eat what’s already been purchased – I am also pretty convinced that better food storage technology could help me better manage and reduce food waste.

This is why I was intrigued to see the Uvera home food storage system at CES. The Uvera smart food storage system is similar to the Silo system in that it has a base unit that will vacuum seal containers to extend the life of food stored in the device. However, what sets the Uvera apart is its use of UVC light.

Why UVC light?

According to Uvera CEO Asrar Damdam, UVC kills bacteria, which helps extend shelf life and make food after.

“UVC light creates a sterilized environment,” Damram said. “It destroys viruses and bacteria such as COVID-19, salmonella, E.coli, and H1N1. So UVC light alone can extend shelf life of food, but now we’re combining vacuuming as well to increase shelf life even further.”

According to Damdam, the company will begin offering the Uvera food storage appliance via a crowdfunding campaign in March of 2022. Let’s hope the company has better luck than the Silo, which is over two years late and hasn’t updated its Kickstarter backers since July.

You can see Damdam explain the Uvera smart food storage system in the video below.

CES 2022: A Look at the Uvera Home Food Storage System

How California’s New Food Waste Law Could Catalyze Interest & Investment in Tech-Powered Food Recovery Platforms

Starting next year, California’s Senate Bill 1383 will begin to require businesses and consumers to separate food waste from their garbage and put them into “green” bins for proper composting.

The legislation, passed in 2016 by then-governor Jerry Brown and the California state legislature, also will begin requiring tier 1 food businesses (grocery retailers, food distributors, food service providers) to divert 20% of food destined to be thrown away to food recovery organizations by the year 2025.

While I think it’s a good thing that everyone in California – both consumers and businesses – will eventually be required to start composting, I’m more interested in how SB 1383 could catalyze interest in platforms that help put food destined for the waste bin on someone’s plate instead. After all, while composting is a net positive from a climate impact reduction perspective, it’s also the last stop on the food waste recovery and mitigation express. In other words, when food feeds someone instead of ending up as fertilizer, everyone wins.

Image Source: CalRecycle SB 1383 Overview

The timing is good for the law, partly because the pandemic has driven home the realization among businesses that it’s their responsibility to try and divert food to local food banks or other food recovery organizations as good corporate citizens. And of course, it also makes good business sense, since by redirecting food to food recovery organizations, these businesses can also claim these donations on their taxes.

As grocery retailers and other tier 1 food businesses ramp up their food diversion efforts, there are some organizations that could help them along the way. One of these companies is Goodr, which offers grocery retailers and other food-related organizations a tech platform and associated service to help them get excess food in the hands of food charities. Goodr sprang into action in its home market of Atlanta during the early days of the pandemic and showed it could really make an impact. Other organizations such as Quest also provide food diversion services and food waste audits.

One of the challenges of a food recovery program is just having the ability to track and manage potential food waste. There are a number of technology platform providers such as Afresh and Crisp that give grocery providers tools powered by machine vision, AI, and other cutting-edge technologies to better predict and manage fresh food inventories. There are even food robot companies like Simbe developing technologies to help assist in food waste reduction management.

Finally, there are marketplaces like Olio and Too Good to Go that enable grocery retailers, restaurants, and other organizations to list excess edible food for sale on a highly-discounted basis to local consumers. While food sold on these platforms will not count towards the company’s 20% food diversion requirement, using them will help a company reduce the overall amount of food wasted and help provide low-cost food to consumers.

But what I am most excited about is how SB 1383 could give rise to new solutions to help food retailers and foodservice providers waste less food. New regulations often serve as catalysts for innovation, giving large businesses a new reason to invest in core technology infrastructure. As SB 1383’s regulations begin to go into effect, innovators with good ideas for new technology to help companies reduce food waste and redirect excess food towards food insecure citizens will have a growing market opportunity for their solutions. This growing opportunity will likely attract more venture investment for a category that has, at least in the past, had a hard time convincing investors there was enough of a market to garner them a return on their investment.

From Machine Learning to Sensor Systems, Food Tech Is Leading the Fight Against Food Waste

Food waste is endemic across the supply chain, with staggering impacts for our climate. Each year we generate a volume of greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to that of 42 coal-fired power plants, and use up enough water and energy to supply more than 50 million homes — all to produce food that goes uneaten, according to the EPA.

From the farm to consumers’ kitchens, a range of technologies is helping to reduce that waste. Below, we’ve rounded up some of the most exciting developments in waste prevention tech, from a data-driven ordering system, to a food container that sends spoilage alerts to your smartphone.


Growers & Processors

Better packaging is one piece of the puzzle. Both Hazel Technologies of Chicago and AgroFresh of Philadelphia have developed next-generation packaging products that release active ingredients into the storage environment. Those ingredients counter the effects of naturally released hormones like ethylene, which would otherwise cause produce to ripen and spoil more quickly.

AgroFresh implements its packaging solutions as a part of an integrated storage management platform, which also uses aggregated data, machine learning, and artificial intelligence to provide insights on spoilage. That platform recently helped Starr Ranch Growers, a Washington state fruit producer, to transition from manual warehouse inspections to a data-driven solution.

Machine learning can be used to also cut food waste at the processing stage, as demonstrated by a study on quality management practices in the dairy industry. Dairy items are some of the most likely food products to go to waste, largely due to contamination by microorganisms. The study, which was recently published in the Journal of Food Protection, analyzed data on bacterial spoilage at different dairy processing facilities to determine which processing, equipment, and inspection factors were most likely to lead to ruined food. Analysis like this could help dairy plants and other food processors to target their efforts on improving the manufacturing processes that will make the biggest difference.


Food Service

For the food service industry, the journey to reducing waste starts with data-driven ordering. Shelf Engine, a Seattle-based startup, generates probabilistic models forecasting the demand for a given store’s individual SKUs. Shelf Engine takes over as an automated order manager, and provides weekly reporting on sales and gross profits. The company estimates that it has saved 547 tons of food from going to waste so far.

San Francisco-based startup Therma is helping retailers to make food storage smarter with a system of humidity and temperature sensors that can be set up in storage areas like freezers and dry rooms. Therma’s system constantly monitors those environments to ensure stable conditions, and creates automated data reports. One of Therma’s clients, the owner of 14 McDonald’s stores in Louisiana and Texas, estimates that the system is saving $4,500 per year in labor costs (not to mention saved costs from avoiding food spoilage).

And when restaurants find that they have surplus food on their hands at the end of the day, software like the MealPass App can help them to partner with nonprofits to deliver those excess meals to families in need. The MealPass App also helps restaurants to claim rewards for those donations by generating data reports that can be used for IRS deductions.


Consumer Kitchens

New technologies are increasingly becoming available to consumers who wish to cut food waste in their own homes. U.K.-based startup BlakBear is developing smart food storage solutions for consumers as well as processors and retailers. As The Spoon reported last year, the company’s smart food containers sense the gases that food items emit as they go bad. The consumer version of the system will incorporate a smartphone app with analytics and alerts about impending spoilage.

To Good To Go, based in Denmark, allows consumers to purchase surplus food from restaurants at a reduced rate. The Too Good To Go app expanded to the U.S. in September, and recently announced a new partnership with restaurant chain Le Pain Quotidien.

The technologies above are saving food from going to waste in the first place. For food waste that does occur, upcycling can help to prevent spoiled food items from languishing in landfills, where they release methane, and instead find them second lives as valuable products. For example, ALT TEX is turning food waste into a polyester textile alternative.

In 2022, we’re likely to see further development of both food-saving technologies and the upcycling industry, as businesses increasingly recognize the cost savings that can go hand-in-hand with reducing waste.

Why “HOW” Is The Next Big Frontier In Food Marketing

The organic food movement was born way back in the early 1900s as a response to the shift towards synthetic fertilizers and pesticides in the early days of industrial agriculture. However, it wasn’t until 1972 when John Battendieri founded Santa Cruz Organics and marketed some of the first packaged organic products. And it wasn’t until 2002 when the USDA adopted national standards for organic products (National Organic Program). This new USDA designation served to usher organic into the mainstream and by the mid-2000s, organic food sales entered a rapid growth phase, increasing by roughly 17-20% per year (compared with 2-3% for conventional food sales). Today, the organic market is a massive 14 billion dollar-a-year industry that continues to grow. Even large corporations such as Wal-Mart are now offering organic choices to their customers.

Ultimately, people wanted to know what was in their food and, more to the point, they wanted to feel good about it. They wanted food to be natural and non-artificial, the way nature intended.

Having satisfied concerns about ‘what’ was in their food, the next question for many of these mainstream consumers became ‘where’ – and quickly, the local food movement exploded. We now see the “local” designation everywhere, from restaurants to grocery stores. Walk into any Sweetgreen, and you’ll see a list of the local farms which have produced all of your salad’s ingredients. And like organic, local is great, the food is fresher and more sustainable.

However, with the ‘what’ and the ‘where’ boxes checked, it’s fair to wonder what the next big question for the more conscious food consumer is going to be. I’m betting it’s ‘how’ — and ‘how’ is about to go mainstream in a very big way.

One of my “aha” moments came during the most recent Super Bowl. Alongside your standard advertisements for new products (GM EV car batteries, 3D Doritos) and tried and true services (Rocket Mortgage, Uber Eats), there was a somewhat unusual yet fascinating ad from Chipotle Mexican Grill. The spot, titled “Can a Burrito Change the World”, featured no new product, and in fact, it barely featured Chipotle at all. In the ad, a young boy asks the question, “What if this [his burrito] could change the world?” The commercial then rapidly tracks the burrito back through the food supply chain, through the planting, watering, growing, shipping stages, and touching on related topics of healthy soil and carbon emissions. The ad ends with the words (notice the “how’s”), “How we grow our food is how we grow our future” — and if that sounds serious, that’s because, well, it is!

The world population is increasing — rapidly. There were 5.4 billion people in 1991, there’s 7.9 billion people currently, and we’re projected to reach 9.9 billion people by 2051. In other words, we’re well on our way to doubling the global population in a period of just 60 years. That’s a lot of mouths to feed, and with the FAO estimating that 1/3 of all food produced globally is lost or goes to waste, it also comes at a huge cost to the planet.

How huge? Roughly 8-10% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions (GHGs) comes from food waste. In fact, if food waste were a country, it would be the 3rd largest emitter of GHGs behind only the US and China.

Therefore, reducing food waste and maximizing efficiencies within the food supply chain is not only critical to feeding our expanding global population, but it’s also a key factor in fighting climate change and saving the planet. Which brings us back to the conversation of ‘how’. Or again, as Chipotle posited, “How we grow our food is how we grow our future”.

Thankfully, the ‘how’ conversation now carries some hope thanks to some incredible change and innovation happening across the food world. From modern vertical farming to booming urban agriculture industries, we’re learning how to grow food locally, more efficiently, and more sustainably. The startup company I helped co-found, Hazel Technologies, has developed solutions to safely and effectively extend the shelf life of produce by controlling the atmosphere around the produce during its shipping process. The result? Shoppers get to buy fresher, longer-lasting produce, food growers net bigger profits, and the environment sees less food waste. This year alone Hazel is projected to save over 500 million pounds of wasted produce — and we’re just getting started.

Fresher, longer-lasting produce that also benefits the environment would seemingly be a hit with the same customer base that buys organic and local, and in fact, that’s exactly what we’re starting to see on the marketing front. Some of the largest farming companies in the world like Mission Produce (the world’s largest avocado distributor) and Oppy (Canada’s largest fresh produce distributor) are now promoting the use of Hazel’s technology in their supply chain. These market leaders see Hazel’s benefits as a major selling point for environmentally conscious consumers — or even just for those who want longer-lasting produce.

From grocery store shelves to Super Bowl ads, it’s clear that ‘how’ is emerging as the next big frontier in food marketing. Case in point, this year’s CES conference, the most influential tech event in the world, will offer Food Tech as a featured part of the conference for the first time ever. Conference attendees can expect to see an incredible showcase of innovation with much of it dedicated to ‘how’ topics like growing, production, and sustainability.

Producing enough food to feed a growing population without over-taxing the planet is going to be one of the world’s biggest challenges in the coming years, but through innovation it can be done. It all boils down to ‘how’.

This industry perspective was written by Pat Flynn. Flynn is CMO and cofounder of Hazel Technologies, a food tech startup that develops products that extend the shelf life of produce.

Grocery Robot Specialist Simbe Robotics Patents System to Detect Produce Freshness

Whether it’s to carry groceries around the store or to deliver them to our front door, it won’t be too much longer before everyday shoppers see robots both in and around the grocery store.

But one potential interesting new use-case for in-store robotics we haven’t heard much about is for detection of produce freshness. That may change soon, as Simbe Robotics, the maker of the Tally 3.0 robot, has just been issued a patent for spectral imaging of produce and meats and detect how fresh they are.

The US patent, which is number 11,200,537 and titled “Method for tracking and characterizing perishable goods in a store,” uses computer vision to record images across a period of time and derive a set of characteristics specific to the type of food. For produce, it can assign a percentage of ripeness, determine whether it is under, over, or at peak ripeness, and determine if there is other biological matter such as a contaminant on the food. It can also determine whether a fruit or vegetable is rotten, damaged, or bruised.

Figure from Simbe Robot’s New Patent

From the patent:

The computer system can access and implement hyper-spectral template histograms or template spectral profiles for “underripe by three days,” “underripe by two days,” “underripe by one day,” “ripe,” “overripe by one day,” “overripe by two days,” “spoiled or rotten”, and “moldy” for specific varietals of fruits and vegetables or for fruits and/or vegetables generally. Similarly, the computer system can access and implement hyper-spectral template histograms or template spectral profiles for “fresh,” “rancid,” “low-fat,” “moderate-fat,” “high-fat,” “low-water content,” “moderate-water content,” and “high-water content” for specific varietals of meats or for meats generally.

For those unfamiliar with the Tally 3.0 robot, the company first unveiled its latest in-store mobile grocery robot in October of 2020. The robot, which wanders grocery store aisles to monitor product levels and detects misplaced items, utilizes computer vision and AI algorithms to capture and provide data to store managers more quickly without needing to send as much information to Simbe’s cloud platform.

This type of mobile inventory checking technology is valuable enough, so much so that grocers like Schnucks have already started deploying the robot across the entire chain of stores. Others, like Hy-vee, are in trials with the Tally 3.0 and likely will expand their fleets over time.

As Simbe’s robots add the capability to help grocers fight food waste – one of the most significant cost drivers for the notoriously thin profit margins in the grocery business – chances are we’ll see more grocers adopt in-store inventory robots en masse.

Hazel Technologies Announces New California Hub To Expand Produce Conserving Technology

Starting in the mid-twentieth century, the advent of new fertilizer production technologies allowed the world to grow crops at a new scale. While that so-called Green Revolution helped producers to feed more people than ever, it also created a focus on crop production rather than systems efficiency. And that imbalanced focus has led to a worldwide agricultural system that wastes about a third of the food it produces, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.

During a stint as a chemistry fellow at the Institute for Sustainability and Energy at Northwestern University, Dr. Aidan Mouat wondered what could happen if we used chemistry to create a new revolution — one that targeted the food supply chain. That idea led to the 2015 launch of Hazel Technologies, a Chicago-based company that manufactures high-tech produce packaging and storage solutions to extend shelf life.

Mouat, Hazel’s co-founder and CEO, told The Spoon that the company’s technologies will save about 500 million pounds of food from going to waste this year. And with a funding arsenal that includes about $90 million in private equity as well as grants from the USDA, the company is working on expanding, starting with a new hub in Fresno, Calif.

A primer on how Hazel’s technology works: The company’s packaging products extend the shelf lives of perishable foods, but not by adding chemicals to the foods themselves. Instead, they release ingredients (in the form of vapor) that help to control the atmosphere around the foods. One product, a sachet the size of a sugar packet, releases ingredients that counteract ethylene — a molecule that accumulates in the atmosphere around packaged fruits and vegetables, and triggers metabolic responses that make them go bad.

Hazel’s Aidan Mouat

Hazel also offers technologies that slow down microbial growth and sprouting. The company’s products come in different forms, from pads and papers that can be inserted into packages, to larger-scale solutions for entire warehouses.

The new Fresno location will bring Hazel closer to California’s bounty of fruit and vegetable producers, facilitating closer cooperation. “In order to do the best analytical postharvest work we can do, we need to be able to simulate the supply chain as perfectly as possible,” Mouat told The Spoon. “And that requires us to be on site with our customers, performing commercial-scale studies in order to truly understand the full ROI and impact that our products can provide for them.”

For instance, Hazel will be able to perform more on-site trials for customers like the Specialty Crop Company, the world’s largest fig producer. It’s the difference between “sending some fruit back east, or getting it to them today, so they can throw in a sachet and pack it today, and get back that real-time data,” Erik Herman, a farming and sales officer at the Specialty Crop Company, told The Spoon.

Mouat said that Hazel has broken ground on the new hub, and that the team is hoping to open the office by the end of this year.

Along with a customer support office and research center, the Fresno facility will incorporate a microdistillery. “As part of our zero waste focus, and in keeping with one of my various hobby interests, we do a lot of distillation of fermented food,” Mouat said. “It’s a great way to make sure that we squeeze out every last calorie, even from our test fruit.”

In the future, Hazel plans to expand its presence in the Americas, Europe, Africa, Southeast Asia, and Oceania, establishing a network of food science research centers. The company will also work on expanding its range of product offerings to protect meats and other foods outside of the produce category.

Hazel also has its eyes on another kind of growth. The company wants to apply its technology at all of the stops along the food supply chain, from the pre-farm stage all the way to retail. The team even hopes to launch a line of consumer products sometime in the next few years.

To Mouat, the key to Hazel’s expansion lies in the accessibility and adaptability of the company’s packaging solutions. Hazel’s products can be integrated into existing supply chains around the world without the need for investment in new infrastructure or heavy equipment.

“You’re not going to be able to protect every crop on the planet, every category of food, with the one-channel approach of reconfiguring supply chains to suit the benefits of some new technology you’re trying to offer,” Mouat said. “If you want to approach a truly democratic solution for world agriculture, you have to lower the use barrier as much as possible — and we’ve done that.”

FryAway Turns Your Used Cooking Oil Into a Disposable Solid

When used cooking oil gets poured down the drain, it doesn’t disappear. It ends up in sewer systems, where it congeals. Over time, more oil and other debris amasses, forming blockages called fatbergs—which cost some cities millions of dollars per year to clean up, and can also cause sewer overflows that pollute surrounding waters.

The alternative method for getting rid of cooking oil—pouring it into a plastic container or glass jar, waiting for it to congeal, and then throwing it away—isn’t perfect, either, as it relegates a recyclable container to a landfill.

FryAway offers another solution. The plant-based powder transforms liquid oil into a solid that can be scooped out of the pan or fryer and thrown away. This week, The Spoon joined FryAway’s founder and CEO Laura Lady on Zoom to find out where the idea came from, and how the product works.

The story of FryAway starts with Lady’s own love of cooking. “Not only am I from New Orleans, I’m also a Latina from New Orleans, and I think it’s pretty safe to say that we love fried foods,” she told The Spoon. “I cook a lot at home. I fry a lot. I am guilty of having poured oil down the drain and not really thinking about where it went.”

Lady first learned about fatbergs and sewer overflow through conversations with friends. At one dinner party, a friend brought up a Japanese product that solidified cooking oil, making it easier to throw away. The idea caught Lady’s interest, and after looking into the product, she decided to develop a similar solution for the U.S. market.

Before FryAway, Lady worked in marketing and product development for children’s toys. “I think product development in general is very much about solving problems creatively. When it comes to toys, you’re trying to figure out how to bring a character to life,” she said. In founding FryAway, she carried over that problem-solving experience into the food space. “It was like bringing two universes together—one being my love for building brands and products, and the other being my love for food.”

During the product development process, Lady drew on chemistry knowledge from her undergraduate years. “I started researching, reading, trying to figure out how an oil could be solidified,” she said. “And I came across the process of hydrogenation, where you add hydrogen to a molecule to harden it.”

Hydrogenation is a familiar term because the process is used in the food industry. Margarine, for example, is made by solidifying vegetable oil using hydrogen-rich saltwater. And that’s basically how FryAway works: You stir the product (a hydrogenated fatty acid) into your used cooking oil while it’s still hot, and a reaction occurs between the two, causing the fat to solidify.

“Once the mixture cools down to room temperature, you start seeing that transformation from liquid to a gelatinous form to a waxy, hard substance that can then be tossed in the trash,” Lady said. “As it solidifies, it will also trap all of that gunk and debris that’s left behind when you’re frying, so that all of that comes out of the pan in one easy step.”

Two versions of the product (one for pan frying, and one for deep frying) are available to consumers on the company’s website and via Amazon. The team is mostly relying on word-of-mouth marketing to raise awareness about the product.

While larger commercial kitchens are already required to use oil remediation services and grease traps, there could be applications for FryAway in smaller restaurants and catering operations, Lady said.

The company has plans to launch a third product in early 2022, and after that, Lady will continue to explore other solutions for repurposing used cooking oil. Driving that expansion and exploration is the idea that we all want to take care of our shared infrastructure and environment—but need simple ways to improve our habits. “At the end of the day,” Lady said, “it’s about making life easier for those of us who love to cook.”