Roberto Gobita, TECTRONIK – Italy

Sterilization processes for LA(C)F has always been existing even if no technology was available to the population. It is a more or less natural way to preserve food for later consumption. Our grandmas used to bottle any kind of vegetable- and not only- , cook them into water for a while and stock them in some cases for a year or so… better a small taste before use!
Today, the industry need the latest technology available to offer quality, competitiveness and food safety to their global customers. Time and temperature are not the only physical parameters which are considered into the latest retort control panel, but more and more F0 has become a “agreeing” value both for retort manufacturers and processors. Let’s have a look on some experiences had with managing F-values as a retort process controller.