Dead, Not Forgotten

I remember hearing the results of a survey years ago that explored why consumers liked McDonald’s fast food restaurants. The biggest reason was that you got the exact same food no matter which location you went to. Edwin Traisman really “supersized” the restaurant’s ability to deliver on that score in 1962 when he discovered a way to reduce moisture in peeled, cleaned and cut potatoes, allowing them to be successfully stored frozen.

His achievement led to many advances for McDonald’s: Traisman’s method improved the consistency, flavor and texture of the fries. Because they could be stored frozen, there was no longer a need for year-round sources of russet potatoes throughout the entire country. It also eliminated the need for each location to clean, peel and cut the potatoes by hand every day, reducing the cost of labor used for french fry prep.

Before McDonald’s, Edwin Traisman worked as a food scientist at Kraft Foods where he contributed to other iconic processed food products like Cheez Whiz and instant pudding.

At the time of his contribution to McDonald’s history he had left his career in favor of buying a McDonald’s franchise in the late 1950’s, proving his uncanny understanding of popular American food trends. He eventually owned five of them in Wisconsin. Traisman also used his restaurants to support public causes: he’d host fund raisers for The Capital Times’ Kids Fund (then the Kiddie Camp) in Madison by earmarking a percentage of a day’s McDonald’s proceeds from all of his locations for the fund. The paper would promote the event, sending families of fast food fans for frozen fries freshly fried the Ed Traisman way.

In 1968 the preparation of McDonald’s fries took another leap when McDonald’s food scientist Ken Strong developed a process involving quick-frying the cut potatoes prior to freezing and a short steam-blanch that preserved the sugars and other flavors of the potato. The combined techniques are called the Traisman-Strong method and make McDonald’s fries what they are today.

After selling his restaurants in the early 1970’s Traisman continued his career in food sciences as a senior research program manager for the Food Research Institute at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. There, he was instrumental in projects dealing with additives and contamination of meat products. He also served until his death as the editor of the Food Research Institute’s quarterly research report.

Edwin Traisman died of a heart attack June, 5 2007 in Madison Wisconsin at age 91.

For more information:
Excerpt from “Fast Food Nation”

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Millions have been eating Cap’n Crunch cereal since its introduction in 1963, but how many of them knew that they had Pamela Low to thank for its sweet taste?

Pamela Low conducted her career at the crossroads of industrial food processing and contracted technology services. As more and more of our foods were being processed by large companies in large quantities, there arose a need for scientists who could find ways to overcome the inherent loss of flavor in these products.

Pamela was one of these people, a flavorist. Wikipedia says, “A flavorist, also known as flavor chemist, is someone who uses both chemistry and art to engineer artificial and natural flavors.”

Her degree in microbiology might have given her technical background but in the case of the Cap’n Crunch coating, her inspiration was her Grandmother. Pamela Low based the coating on the sauce of a recipe that her grandmother, Luella Low, made for Sunday dinners at their Derry, New Hampshire home, consisting of rice with a butter-and-brown sugar sauce.

Pamela Low developed the now-famous coating while working for Boston’s Arthur D. Little consulting firm, which pioneered the concept of contracted technology research. In addition to flavoring products, the company played key roles in the development of operations research, the word processor, the first synthetic penicillin, and NASDAQ.

During her three decades at Arthur D. Little, Low was also involved in flavoring snacks such as Almond Joy and Mounds candy bars.

Pamela Low died June 1, 2007 at New London Hospital in New Hampshire. She was age 79.

For more information:
Read this article about flavorists
Review these technical articles for flavorists

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