Research and Innovation Food Scientist

Paradise Tomato Kitchen•Louisville, KY

About The Position

This position provides a strong technical expertise to develop new products, renovate the existing products and drive the innovation per the customer and business needs. This person plays an integral role within the company, working directly with the customers, and internal cross functional teams to drive the highest customer satisfaction and the value.

Requirements

BS in Food Science/Food Technology
4 years of experience in product development with a minimum of 3 years of developing tomato-based and/or hot sauces preferred.
Experience with thermal processing technologies.
Excellent collaboration skills and able to excel in a team environment
Sensory evaluation experience and skills
Experience with a wide variety of equipment, kitchen set-up, cooking techniques and operator execution; or in-depth knowledge of key applicable equipment or processes
Ability to read, analyze, and interpret common scientific and technical journals, and ingredient spec sheets
Ability to flex schedule to support 24-hour production scheduling requirements for test products
Ability to travel and work at California plant during In-Season (July -Sept)
Ability to communicate and interact effectively with various sales, marketing, and technical services personnel
Computer and software skills
Ability to recognize, analyze, and develop solutions and initiate problem-solving actions
Must have proven formulation and commercialization experience.

Responsibilities

Develops new products working closely with the sales team and the customers that are commercially feasible based on the project scope. Partners closely with corporate research chefs to confirm and calibrate that developed products meet finished product applications and culinary gold standards. Scope includes products manufactured at Paradise’s own manufacturing facilities and/or at co-manufacturing partners.
Works on reformulations, product renovations, and cost optimization projects by revising the product formulations in a cross functional collaborative environment to ensure it would meet the current manufacturing capabilities.
Works closely with Project Manager to commercialize the products and ensures that the finished product meets customer’s analytical and sensory expectations.
Formulates seasoning blends to reduce individual herbs and spices to match ingredient statements, nutritional profile, and sensory attributes of existing products to reduce manufacturing complexity. Makes prototypes to confirm that the finished product meets analytical and sensory specifications.
Supports Procurement Team with regards to the ingredient substitutions, replacements, and formula modifications by making prototypes and testing it for the analytical and sensory compliance per the needs driven by internal and external threats, challenges and opportunities.
Identifies areas of cost optimization through strategic raw material procurement, ingredient substitutions, or processing efficiencies. Reduces introduction and removal of unique raw materials from the product portfolio to reduce ingredient management complexities.
Reviews batching data, analytical data, financial standard, and customer specifications to update the formula standards for all the products on an annual basis. Partners with Quality Assurance to gather and analyze formula deviations, product yield, and processing modifications/improvements/innovations prior to updating the standards. Work closely with the Processing team to propose changes and recommendations to the manufacturing process should any deviations be found in not meeting the standards.
Supports culinary ideation sessions for the customers by developing commercially feasible products. Assists the chefs and/or sales to conduct the culinary meetings and/or product presentations in-house and off-site as per the business needs.
Scouts for new ingredients and processing technologies for innovation partnering with internal partners (procurement, engineering), and external suppliers.
Support forward thinking growth strategies laid out by the sales team analyzing consumer insights, and flavors trends in collaboration with the chefs to propose new product platforms and growth channels.
Maintain R&I lab to support day-to-day functioning. Duties include but are not limited to ingredient management (ingredient stocking, disposal of expired materials, ingredient ordering, technical paperwork), packaging inventory management (packaging stocking, disposal of old materials), lab supplies management, organized storage of competitor products, Paradise’s finished products, and trial run products, lab cleaning and garbage disposal, etc.
Develops technical training documentation such as Tomato 101, Hot Sauce 101, Ingredient 101, etc. to drive technical awareness, knowledge, and training for the customers and internal cross functional teams.
Generates and maintains technical documentation, reports, case studies, and other pertinent information to have robust knowledge transfer capabilities for the internal teams.
Other duties as assigned