AQA GCSE Food Preparation and Nutrition key terms

The distance food travels from its producer to its consumer.

Illness caused by eating contaminated food, which may produce nausea, vomiting, diarrhoea, stomach pain or fever.

An appliance with interchangeable blades or attachments for preparing food by chopping, slicing, grating or mixing.

The origin of food or ingredients, including where they come from and how they are produced.

Reliable access to enough safe, nutritious, affordable, high-quality food to meet people's needs.

Deterioration in a food’s appearance, texture, smell or flavour that makes it unacceptable to eat.

Providing food for people now while protecting the resources and food sources needed by future generations.

A thermometer inserted into food to measure its internal temperature during cooking or reheating.

Food or parts of food discarded during production, processing, selling, preparation or consumption.

The addition of vitamins or minerals to food to increase its nutritional value.

A food with a nutrient added to it, such as calcium added to a plant-based milk alternative.

A reactive substance that can damage body cells.

Animal production in which animals have access to the outdoors for at least part of the day.

Sugars added to food and drink, together with sugars naturally present in honey, syrups and fruit juices. Sugars within intact fruit and naturally present in milk are not free sugars.

Drying and deterioration of frozen food exposed to cold, dry air; it affects quality rather than safety.

Storing food at about −18°C, which stops most bacterial growth but does not reliably kill bacteria.

The useful job an ingredient performs in a food, such as egg protein setting a quiche filling or stabilising a foam.

An ingredient added to a finished dish to improve its appearance and sometimes its flavour, such as fresh herbs.

A mixture in which gas bubbles are dispersed through a liquid, such as air bubbles in whisked egg white.

The process in which starch granules absorb liquid and swell when heated, releasing starch into the surrounding liquid and thickening it.

The setting of a mixture as it cools or is chilled; for example, a cooked starch-based custard becoming a gel.

Food from an organism whose genetic material has been deliberately altered using genetic technology to produce a desired characteristic.

A food produced from an organism whose genetic material has been deliberately altered to give it particular characteristics.

A coating, such as egg wash, syrup or a reduced sauce, used to give food a shiny finish and sometimes change its flavour or surface texture.

Coating food with a liquid such as beaten egg, syrup or sauce to improve its colour, shine, flavour or finish.

The long-term rise in the Earth's average temperature; it is one part of climate change.

The elastic protein network developed when wheat flour is mixed with liquid and kneaded, helping dough hold together and stretch.

An enlargement of the thyroid gland that causes swelling at the front of the neck; iodine deficiency is one possible cause.