Sr. Food Scientist

The Marzetti Company•Orange Township, OH

About The Position

The Sr. Food Scientist leads development and commercialization of salad dressings, sauces, and condiments. The role calls for strong expertise in emulsions, flavor development, ingredient functionality, formulation, and process optimization, along with project-management leadership. The scientist drives new product development, improves product performance, and mentors junior scientists while working with cross-functional teams to bring products to market. The position leads formulation and process development, exploring ingredient technologies and optimizing products for taste, texture, stability, nutrition, cost, and production scalability. It provides technical direction on emulsions, flavor, and stabilizer systems; guides experimentation and technical risk assessment; and resolves complex formulation and processing issues. The role supports regulatory and quality compliance, including food safety, labeling, product specifications, and consistent production. It leads plant trials and production start-up, transfers formulations from laboratory to commercial scale, and optimizes processing parameters. The scientist also partners with internal teams, suppliers, and external partners, communicates recommendations to technical and non-technical audiences, and stays informed about ingredient innovation, processing technologies, consumer trends, and industry developments.

Requirements

6+ years of experience in sauce, dressing, or condiment formulation.
Demonstrated experience developing and commercializing emulsion-based products from concept through production.
Strong technical understanding of emulsion science, ingredient functionality, flavor systems, stabilizers, preservatives, and texture development.
Experience with dressing and sauce processing technologies, including high-shear mixing, homogenization, batch processing, continuous processing, hot-fill, cold-fill, and scale-up.
Knowledge of shelf-life design and interpretation, including physical, chemical, microbiological, and sensory stability.
Hands-on experience with analytical and physical testing, including pH, titratable acidity, viscosity, water activity, salt, Brix, color, sensory evaluation, and stability testing.
Ability to collaborate with cross-functional teams, mentor junior scientists, and drive R&D strategy.
Strong project management and critical thinking skills.
Excellent communication skills for interfacing with internal and external teams.

Nice To Haves

Bachelor’s degree in food science, food chemistry, or a related field preferred.

Responsibilities

Lead development of salad dressings, sauces, and condiments aligned with market trends, customer strategies, regulatory changes, and sustainability initiatives.
Optimize formulations for taste, texture, stability, nutrition, and cost-effectiveness while ensuring scalability for mass production.
Explore emerging ingredient technologies, including next-generation emulsifiers, natural preservatives, and plant-based alternatives.
Serve as a technical resource for emulsion development, flavor, and stabilizer systems.
Troubleshoot formulation and processing challenges, including separation, viscosity inconsistencies, and flavor matching.
Guide formulation strategy, experimental design, technical risk assessment, and decision-making for assigned projects.
Provide technical leadership and mentorship to food scientists and technologists.
Ensure formulations comply with applicable FDA, FSMA, food safety, labeling, and customer requirements.
Partner with regulatory affairs on ingredient statements, nutrition information, allergen reviews, claims, and label compliance.
Collaborate with quality assurance and manufacturing teams to define product specifications and ensure consistent production execution.
Lead plant trials and production start-up; troubleshoot processing challenges in batch and continuous production environments.
Partner with operations and engineering to transition formulations from laboratory scale to commercial production.
Optimize processing parameters such as shear rates, homogenization, and order of addition to improve texture and stability.
Collaborate with culinary, consumer insights, marketing, sales, procurement, packaging, quality, regulatory, operations, and engineering teams.
Work with ingredient suppliers and external partners to evaluate technologies, troubleshoot issues, and identify innovation opportunities.
Communicate technical recommendations to technical and non-technical audiences.
Stay current on ingredient innovation, processing technologies, consumer trends, competitive products, and industry developments.