Glossary
Food Scientist Terms & Vocabulary
15 essential food scientist terms with plain-English definitions: the vocabulary you’ll hear in training and on day one.
Key food scientist vocabulary
These 15 terms come up constantly in food scientist training, on the job and in interviews. Knowing them helps you follow instructions, document accurately and sound prepared.
- Accelerated shelf life
- Faster aging tests.
- Clean label
- Simple ingredients.
- Emulsion
- Mixed oil and water.
- FDA
- Food regulator.
- Formulation
- Recipe design.
- HACCP
- Food safety plan.
- Nutrition facts
- Label nutrient info.
- Pathogen
- Disease-causing microbe.
- Pilot plant
- Small-scale production.
- Scale-up
- Lab to plant.
- Sensory panel
- Taste testing group.
- Shelf life
- How long food stays good.
- Spec sheet
- Product requirements.
- Texture
- Mouthfeel.
- Water activity
- Available water in food.
Practice these terms
Test yourself with the free Food Scientist practice test: it includes vocabulary questions built from this list. For a complete course, see Food Scientist training.
Browse terms from every career in our career glossary.