In light of a number of recent processed food safety scares, a North Coast macadamia processor has invested heavily in steam-pasturisation prior to packaging, a world first. Macadamia Processing Company (MPC), a 100 per cent grower owned co-operative at Alphadale, has spent $1.7m on the wet steam plant which will be used this coming harvest season for the first time.
Recently there have been product recalls of packaged lettuce in Australia and last year in the US a salmonella outbreak in processed peanut butter cost ConAgra $11.2m. Just last week US company Texas Star Nut and Food recalled pistachios as a result of a similar bacterial contamination.
The macadamia market is not immune from health scares, with 16 products recalled in the US last year and another four during January and February - although none of those involved MPC, which processes 25 per cent of Australia’s macadamia crop.
The steam pasteuriser, using European technology from Napasol, incorporates atmospheric vacuum to draw moisture away from the nuts, retaining texture and flavour in the end product. But despite this benefit to the consumer there will be plenty of hurdles on the production floor, where this two-hour cleansing process is likely to cause bottlenecks during peak periods.
MPS has worked through difficult issues before - investing $3m of its own money (plus $1.48 from an Ausindustry grant) in a husk-fired nut dryer that saves more than $800,000 annually by not burning liquid natural gas and which has reduced its carbon footprint from drying by 99 per cent.
MPC also has the ability to track every vacuum-packed 11.4kg box of nuts through a unique bar code.
Source: goodfruitandvegetables.com.au