Cooking with Liquid Nitrogen in Food Industry
- Joy Nguyen
- Aug 9, 2018
- 3 min read
Hi guys, I'm Joy welcome back to my personal blog!
Today, I'm looking at how nitrogen can be used in the food and beverage industry – from factories, to restaurants to pubs… The liquid nitrogen is also know as one of type of "Molecular Gastronomy Technique".
How the liquid nitrogen work?
At a temperature of -321 degrees F (-196 degrees C), liquid nitrogen will flash freeze any food it touches. As it boils away, it gives off a dense nitrogen fog that can add atmosphere and drama to food preparation. Unfortunately, liquid nitrogen must be transported in specially made flasks and can be dangerous if it touches skin.
In the past
Over the past three decades, Europe has witnessed the widespread development of the frozen food industry. Despite the already enormous growth experienced by the industry, the demand for frozen foodstuffs remains increasingly large, fuelled by ever changing lifestyles.
Cryogenic food freezing using liquid nitrogen or carbon dioxide as an expendable refrigerant has been established in Europe since the early 1960's. The high pricing of
bulk carbon dioxide in the UK has meant that liquid nitrogen has become the most
widely used expendable refrigerant in the UK.
Cryogenic freezing offers a range of unique benefits, including:
High cooling rates (quick freezing)
High throughput/low floor space
Flexibility (adaptable to different products, high turn up capability)
Low capital entry
The first mention of liquid nitrogen in association with food happened in 1890 when it appeared in a Victorian cookbook. Since then it has been a popular way of freezing and serving food in trendy restaurants.
Liquid nitrogen can also be used to chill drinks, freeze alcohol and pulverise food into small shards and powder.
Present day - "Nitrogen Ice Cream"
In nowadays, the liquid nitrogen is widely used to create ice cream that most ice cream shops centrifuge bowls filled with ice cream mixtures with a mixer to prevent the formation of large ice crystals, but flash freezing with liquid nitrogen circumvents that.
Using liquid nitrogen to make ice cream is quicker than the more traditional methods and as quicker freezing leads to smaller ice crystals – it leads to a delicious dessert.
There are lots of ice cream shops across the world which specialise in nitrogen ice cream, crazy flavors and a lot of theatre!
Why it is important?
Using liquid nitrogen as a freezing agent isn’t new; it’s used in other industries to preserve samples of cells and tissues, as well as to flash freeze food products for preservation.
However, liquid nitrogen become a new new trends into the food industry and most of restaurant menu is including the plate made from liquid nitrogen and they like to introduce it with their customer. This trend is also know as a breakthrough for the food industry and provides a fun and unique method to develop dishes that have unique textures.
The dark side of Liquid Nitrogen
This is the part of the post where we have to get serious for a little bit… Although nitrogen has many great uses in the food and beverage industry, it can be dangerous if misused.
Although it is not toxic, nitrogen is an inert gas, which means that it replaces oxygen in the atmosphere. The atmosphere normally consists of 21% oxygen – a drop to 15% is enough to cause oxygen deprivation (hypoxia) in the body, and a drop to 8% is enough to cause unconsciousness and death.
When using nitrogen, either in gas or liquid form, it is important not to use it in a confined space, ensure it is stored safely and to have adequate ventilation.
Although you can get kits for making your own nitrogen-imbued food and drink, it is always best to leave the creation to the professionals. As long as food and drink has been prepared and served safely, nitrogen has such a low boiling point, all nitrogen will have evaporated by the time you get round to enjoying your ice cream or coffee.
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