Senior Sensory & Ingredient Evaluation Specialist

HelloFresh•Toronto, ON

8d•Hybrid

About The Position

The Product Innovation team is looking for a Senior Sensory & Ingredient Evaluation Specialist to serve as our lead technical evaluator and procurement liaison. Reporting to the Manager, Ingredient Strategy, you will be the engine behind our ingredient excellence. While the Manager sets the portfolio vision, you are the one "under the hood", standardizing how we test, validating new supplier submissions, and ensuring that our procurement tenders result in ingredients that are both cost-effective and culinary-approved. This role requires in-office attendance 4 days a week.

Requirements

4-year degree in Food Science, Culinary Science, or a related technical field. A deep understanding of food chemistry and sensory methodology is essential.
3+ years of experience in Sensory Science, Food R&D, Quality Assurance, or Technical Sourcing within the food industry.
The "Procurement Mindset": You understand the basics of supply chain and tenders; you know that a great ingredient also has to be a viable business solution.
Technical Palate: You have formal training or significant experience in sensory evaluation (e.g., Triangle testing, Descriptive Analysis) and can articulate flavour profiles with precision.
Project Management Skills: You can juggle multiple "cuttings" and supplier samples simultaneously without losing track of the data.
Proficiency in Excel is a must.
A "Foodie": You are genuinely obsessed with the difference between two types of soy sauce or the viscosity of a balsamic glaze.
Adaptable: Able to navigate complex timelines and a high-volume portfolio.
Collaborative: You enjoy being the "technical glue" that holds Culinary and Procurement together.
Analytically Rigorous: You don't just say something "tastes good"—you back it up with data and standardized metrics.

Nice To Haves

Experience with sensory software (like Compusense or RedJade) or PLM systems is a major plus.

Responsibilities

Lead Sensory Evaluation: Own the execution of sensory testing for all new ingredient submissions. You will design and facilitate "Gold Standard" cuttings, ensuring every ingredient is tasted, tested, and scored against rigorous culinary benchmarks.
Define "Best-in-Class" Testing: Develop and refine standardized testing protocols. Whether it’s testing the meltability of a new cheese or the shelf-life stability of a sauce, you ensure our methodologies are scientific, repeatable, and scalable.
Procurement Technical Partner: Serve as the technical point of contact for the Procurement team during RFPs and tenders. You will analyze supplier samples, provide technical scorecards, and help Procurement understand the quality trade-offs in different sourcing options.
Ingredient Development & Iteration: Work directly with vendors to "tweak" ingredients. If a spice blend isn't quite right or a protein is losing moisture, you’ll provide the technical feedback loop to suppliers to develop a better version for our boxes.
Data Gatekeeper: Maintain the technical integrity of our ingredient database. You will ensure that sensory data, specification sheets, and testing results are meticulously documented to inform future SKU rationalization.
Operational Validation: Ensure ingredients don’t just taste good in a lab, but perform in the real world. You’ll coordinate "home kitchen" stress tests to simulate how our customers will actually experience the product.
All other duties, as assigned

Benefits

Box Discount - Amazing discounts on 1 box per week! 75% discount on weekly HelloFresh and Chefs Plate meal kits AND 50% off weekly Factor meal box.
Health & Wellness - Health & Dental benefits from day 1, a Health Spending Account, unlimited access to the Headspace app to meet your self-care needs, and 25% discount on GoodLife fitness memberships!
RRSP Matching - Competitive RRSP matching program offered
Vacation & PTO - Time off is also an important part of self-care! We offer generous vacation and PTO to help you create a good work-life balance.
Family Benefits - A parental leave top-up program for expectant parents.
Growth & Development - We support your career progression, provide development opportunities, and invest in your continued learning through our organization wide L&D fund.
Work Hard & Have Fun - From team socials to engaging company days, you’ll have plenty of opportunity to experience the fun!
Diversity & Inclusion Initiatives - With impactful ERG’s like FreshPride, Women Empowered and LIMES, we are committed to our diversity, equity & inclusion efforts.
Food Puns - this one is kind of a big dill if you haven’t already noticed. We even have some punny meeting room names!
Flexible Hybrid Approach - Flexible Hybrid is a people-first approach that is based on choice, trust, personalization, and empowers teams to choose when and how often they work from the office and work from home, in addition to team days and company days. This means a minimum of 2 days in office per week, with most teams in office between 2-3 days a week.