beta concept

we finally reachs the end of the semester. It was crazily hectic throughout the semester but it was worth it. The last process of our final year project this semester was Beta Concept.

Basically Beta concept is to get the finalized two concepts out of 5 alpha concepts. The finalized concepts are the concepts that we combine from initial idea and also from some of the alpha concepts. The finalized concepts that we chose are rainbow rice ball and also crispy rice burger. As for the rainbow rice ball the filling is changed to ayam sambal kicap( spicy soy sauce chicken) and sweet & sour chicken. Why we call it rainbow? this is because the rice balls will be colorful. The color comes from vegetable puree that we going to mix with the rice and finally shape it into balls. As for the crispy rice burger, nothing will be change from the initial idea.

We are also had to do our final presentations on the concepts. The judges for the presentation were lecturers from Culinology course which were Dr.Wendy and Dr.Nima. There were strict on the research part of our presentation. Most probably because our presentation contain lack of information. all of us accept the comments and critics from the judges and planned to do better next semester.

cheers,
Shuhada Zuki

feasibility study & concept acceptance

After we came up with the alpha concept we continue by doing feasibility study. This step helps us to see the possible challenge on making the product normally or in mass prodcution. We need to figure out all the possible problems and have to find solutions for the problem. 

First of all, most of our products have their own weaknesses. Few of the product are too complicated to be made and the preparation will be very long. Whereas, in the mass production there are plenty of equipment that can be used to developed our product. Minor changes are still needed to be made.

After found out all the problems and solutions, we continue with the concept acceptance. Again, we went back to SK Subang to find out the kids opinion on our products. We made samples of the product from Plasticine and paper. From here, the kid able to estimate the size of the product and manage to imagine how the real product will look like. We asked them what do they think on the product and jotted down notes on their answers. 

Finally, we made few changes based on the comments given from the students and also parents. 2 products are chosen for the beta concept.  

domain 3 : ideation

sorry for the late post. This week is all about ideation. ince we alread had our market study and focus group, we can start our ideation already. The hints that we had from the students were:

1. Chicken

2. Rice

3. Hidden vegetables

4. less than RM2

So yeah, it sounded hard as it is. First of all, to make things clearer I should explain what is ideation first. Basically Domain 3 (ideation) contains s step which are :

a. alpha concept

b. feasibility study

c. concept acceptance

d. beta concept

The most important aspects that need to have in ideation is creativity. But in this alpha concept the creativity are narrow down to food that are innovative, nutritious, convenient and of course taste good. 

We started our brainstorming by jotting down whatever we had in our brains then we mix and max all the ideas and cooperate into dishes. 10 dishes were created based on the ideas.  

Based on the 10 ideas weonly had to choose 5 of it. So here are some of the dishes that are chosen, Well basically there are few changes that we made and these pictures are not the most updated pictures.

rainbow rice ball

rice burger with vegetable nuggets

the cone 

cheers

Shuhada Zuki

                                                                                                 

Focus Group

Another Domain had past. We went to Sk Subang again, but this time for different purposed. This time we need to conduct our Domain 2 which is Focus group. Based on wikipedia, focus group means:

"A  form of qualitative research in which a group of people are asked about their perceptions, opinions, beliefs, and attitudes towards a product, service, concept, advertisement, idea, or packaging."

Basically we need to collect deeper information from the school kids. It was not easy as I thought it would be. Each team gets 12-13 students. Our group had 12 students for our focus group. Some of them are quite talkative and some were quite shy. We started by introducing our objective of the day and be friendly to them. This helps them to be more comfortable to give their opinions. 

Our focus group research tools contain 3 different categories which are eating patterns, Symbolic studies and also  purchasing behavior. First of all we started by asking them their eating patterns. This category of questions give us information on how they like to consume their foods, whether they prefer using hands or cutlery while eating,  and most important was what they love to eat. By knowing these information we get some hints on how to create our product based on what they like. 

Second category was symbolic studies. This study is related more on their feeling toward the food they eat, their experience on canteen foods, and what they think of canteen foods. Basically the information that we gained from this study help us to understand their thoughts of canteen food and also their expectation what canteen food should be. Luckily, our group managed to get a very enthusiastic group of students. I am glad that they willing to share their thoughts with us.

Finally, we asked them on the purchasing behavior. We mostly asked them on ideas of packaging, whether they accept food innovations, and also their acceptable expenditure on foods. We get a lot of different answers from each students which also give us a quite hard time on recording the data.

We need to listen to each students opinion and tabulate their opinion word by word based on the questions and categories. By doing this, it helps us to see repeating points or important points that we wanted. It took us almost 3 days to finish on listening to the recording nd also watching the videos. Not only listening to opinions, we need to look at expressions when the questions were being asked as well. By looking at their body language we managed to observed whether the students are interested or not, or get some hints of their feelings when they answer the questions. 

Finally we need to present our data on this coming monday. Hopefully, we managed to present our data well and get less comment from Ms.Chong this time :p

Cheers!

Shuhada Zuki

Food Product Development : Conducting Survey

             Another week had passed... Last week was the day that we finally conduct our survey. The first survey was in SK Subang which is a primary school. The target of our survey was 100 students. At first it sounded impossible. How can we managed to get 100 students to give feedback on our survey since we only had 1 hour to conduct it. Sounds impossible right?!!

             We left campus and managed to reach there on time since there were no jammed that time. The school gave us a venue and had to wait for the students to come in. They came in a batch of group and we had to divide them into 3 groups. It was quite awkward in the beginning but we managed to arrange everything in order. Helen and I were assigned to do briefing for the kids and help them to answer our survey, whereas Eugene and Marquita measured the height and also their weight. We managed to corperate very well inthe group. Each of us knows their roles and play with it very well.

            Then we also managed to finish our parents survey on the next day. I had to admit that I wasn't sure that I can do it in the first place. We had conducted our survey in the campus. It was hard since some people does not want to help us with the survey and also we had a hard time to approach people because all of them look super busy. But finally we did it. So proud of us!!

I was hesitated and tried to avoid doing survey the whole time before this. Since this is very important for our final project I know I had to push myself and build of my confidence level. Actually, this surveys help me to build my confidence level to the MAX!! I don't think I will have problem to approach people in the future.

Food Product Development : The Beginning Of The Final

            New semester had just begun and my holiday mood are still on. Our class started at 12 p.m on Monday. After 4 hours of class with Mr. Robin we continue our Food Product Development. First Ms.Chong explained the introduction of the subject and she continued by explaining and introducing our final project. The topic of our final project is Malaysia School Health Meal Program. After explaining about our project, Ms.Cong continued by introducing our group members for this project.  

          

             I was very happy with the grouping did by Ms.Chong, my group mates for our final project is Helena, Marquita and Eugene. Me and Marquita being wishing to get into the same group for at least 3 weeks before the semester start. We both were very glad to get in the same group because both of us can work very well in the kitchen for last semester. We started our discussion on the same day because we need to a come out with 2 surveys for the school kid and also for parents. 

             

              Well, to come out with good surveys are not really a piece of cake. We didn't get the picture of how to organised it in the beginning. So we just brain storming and randomly listed out few topic to ask in the survey. Each of us had different kinds of ideas of what to write. Then we combined each of the idea and eliminate which is not necessary. This session give me an impression that our group can really work with each other very well. Each of us listen to each other through out the discussion and willing to share ideas. 

               

                 Next Wednesday will be the day that we carry out the survey. Even though there are few things that we need to polish on our questions in the survey, I hope all of us will carry out this survey smoothly and get the data that we needed.