So, how would you turn that into the instant coffee you get out of a jar?
What's maize?
How do you get sugar out of this?
Just try and chew one. See how hard it is.
I'll break my teeth.Hard? Isn't it?
How on earth would you turn something so hard into a cornflake?
The trouble with breakfast is that you're always in a rush.
You know what it's like. You've got kids to feed.
You've got to get ready for work.
You certainly don't have time
to think about where all your breakfast foods havecome from.
Most of us can't get inside a food factory.
But, if you could, you wouldn't see much -
just miles of pipe and stainless-steel vats.
I'm going to go back to basics to find out
what they're really doing to our food.
Inside this barn, I've set up my very own food factory.
The inside of this barn may look like it's full of farmyard junk,
but it's got everything I need to reveal
the secrets inside supermarket food.
Cornflakes - the instant breakfast. Simply open the pack and pour.
We take them for granted and they stay fresh for ages.
Cornflakes were only invented 100 years ago.
Someone had to discover a recipe.
It's weird, but what they found out
is that to make cornflakes, they have to take out a
whole load of goodness and then artificially stuff it back in.
If I make my own cornflakes here in the barn,
we'll see exactly why it's so important to do this.
This is the starting place of cornflakes.
They're made from maize, which is more commonly known as corn.
If I pull back the leaves on this here,
I can expose these hard, yellow kernels.
If I wanted to eat this, I'd have to pick it fresh and cook it.
For breakfast, we want something that's quick and easy
and that can be stored in our cupboards for weeks.
These are dried corn kernels.
The first important secret to making a cornflake is what not to use.
The kernel contains a tiny germ which is the seed.
While it's growing, it feeds off all the starchy material inside.
The outer layer is the bran.
For cornflakes, we don't want the bran.
That's the thing that helps you become quite regular on the toilet.
The bran would spoil the cornflake's texture.
The next thing to get rid of is the germ.
In here are all the vitamins and the proteins,
so we don't want that.
Yes, that's right.
Even though the germ is full of nutrition,
I have to take all of it out.
This is because, over time, the oils will go rancid
and spoil the cornflakes in the box.
What I'm left with now is, basically, starchy hard material.
This is the bit that we're going to turn into our cornflakes.
So, the only thing you need to make a cornflake
is the pure starch from the kernel.
It would take ages to collect the starch by hand.
I'm going to knock up something that will hopefully let me do it quicker.
I need to build something that can separate the different parts -
the germ, the bran and the all-important starch.
This is pretty wild, this.
Right, well that seems to have done the trick.
Let's have a look what's happened.
So, there's my bits of bran.
That's separated out lovely.
What have I got here? Little bits of germ here.
And these are the bits that I want.
This is what I'm going to turn into my cornflakes -
these little starchy bits here which are called grits.
I've been grinding my corn for almost an hour
and I haven't even got enough to make a spoonful of cornflakes.
So, I'm going to switch to Plan B and use some prepared corn grits.
That's about right.
But starch is pretty tasteless.
So, before I cook them, I have to add a bit of flavouring.
This is malt syrup.
Good job I don't have to do this every single morning for breakfast.
There we are.
The grits are so hard, we have to cook them in a pressure cooker.
The factory heat them under very high pressure for 90 minutes.
So, I'm going to do the same.
It's gonna be a while before my cornflakes
are ready for milk and sugar.
I've got two of these.
These are two litres, aren't they?
Yeah.Right. How many of these do you reckon
the average cow produces a day?
The average cow?The average cow.
Think of Daisy in a shed, milking away.
How many of these is she going to churn out?
Probably 50?
50. I wouldn't mind a cow like that. It would be brilliant.
20 odd.
We think four.Four?
Probably six. Six? That's not bad.
It's actually ten. These are two litres.Two litres of this a day.
So, the average is 20 litres a day.
That's quite a lot. I didn't know that.
As a farmer, I think it's important to keep farm animals happy.
I'm concerned about the pressures put on dairy cows
to produce 20 litres of milk a day.
I was astonished to discover
that robots might come to the help of cows.
# Rolling, rolling, rolling
# Rolling, rolling, rolling, Rawhide. #
It's milking time here at Middle Burrows farm in Devon,
run by the Kneller brothers. These are their Holstein Friesian cattle,
which they milk in the traditional way, twice a day.
This tradition has lasted for centuries.
Dairy cattle are specially bred to produce lots of milk.
They only keep producing if they're milked day in day out.
The cows have no choice in when they're milked.
They're simply rounded up and herded into the parlour.
How you doing, Chris? How you doing, Mike?
How you doing, mate? Are you all right?
What time did you start milking?
We start at about five in the morning.
Five in the morning. How long to get all these girls milked?
About three, three and a half hours.
So, to get your whole herd milked twice takes you seven-hours.Yeah.
That's a lot of work, isn't it? Yeah, yeah.
Do you want a hand?Yeah, sure.
Although Chris and Mike have to milk the cows twice a day,
they know cows don't much like being herded about.
Herding makes them anxious and when they're stressed,
they produce less milk.
This is the traditional way that dairy cows are milked in the UK.
Yeah, most cows are milked in this way.
The first thing we do is clean the teat.
And then just plug her in.Yeah.
Show me. I've never done this before.It goes through the legs.
It's quite a fiddly process, isn't it?Yeah.
There we go, we can see it coming through here.
Chris and Mike tell me the important thing about milking
is to keep the cows calm.
This one going on this one there.
Oh, flipping Nora!
Are any of these kickers?
Talk about nervous.
I'm losing my bottle this close-up to the milk producers.
Now when you're getting the cow...
When plugging the cow into the milking machine,
you forget how close you are to the other cow's backside
because your head's in here, you look up,
there's a bum right above you.
So, it's really easy to get a cow pat shampoo
and then a cow wee rinse.
I'm always looking up now.
This is hard for the farmers and it's not so easy on the cows either.
Wahay! That's not milk, is it?
HE LAUGHS
I was there five seconds ago.
Each cow takes ten minutes.
Outside, there's an impatient queue waiting for me to get on with it.
But milking doesn't have to be this stressful for the cow or the farmer.
A few yards up this hill, in a shiny new shed,
is the brothers' second herd.
Now, they're not milked at 5am or 3pm.
In fact, they're not milked twice a day,
but they do produce more milk. So, how can that be?
These are the same sort of cows - Holstein Friesians.
The difference is, these girls decide when they want to be milked.
Chris and Mike don't milk these cows.
They've handed the job over to a robot.
This doesn't sound like very good news for the cows,
but let me tell you something,
it could be the best thing that's ever happened to them.
This is the machine which puts cows in charge.
Wow!
This is like something out of science fiction. It's incredible.
You can buy a house or a very fancy sports car
forthe £120,000 price tag.
But this robot cuts a full day's work down to an hour and a half.
It never gets tired and the cows seem to like it.
The cow approaches the robot through a gate.
The computer identifies her from her collar tag,
dispenses the correct amount of feed and, while she tucks in,
the machine washes her teats and then collects the milk.
This robot is clever technology.
It reduces the amount of labour needed to milk a cow.
It also makes milking less stressful for the animal.
So the brothers don't have to hook up each cow to the machine.
But how does this reduce the stress for the cows?
You bring all the cattle in, herd them all in,
and then push them through this system?
No, we don't have to be here at all. They come in of their own accord.
So, they come in when they want?
Yes.That is incredible. Why are they coming in when they want?
As they produce milk during the day, their udders get tighter
and they just want to come in and relieve the pressure.
So, it's just like, I fancy a bit of a milk.
Milk, milk, milk. Ah!
That's it. We all know what that feels like.
Instead of being rounded up twice a day,
these cows come in to be milked whenever they want.
In fact, they like it so much,
some cows come in as many as four times a day.
Since they come into the parlour whenever they want to,
it looks to me like their loving it.
Do you ever getthe odd cow that gets a bit addicted to this machine
and thinks, "I could do with another milk."
I would say so. Some keep coming round, think they can,
but there is a gauging system that says,
"Hang on, you've been milked enough today. Go back!"
So, if number 26 has been round eight times, the computer will go,
actually, no, you've had your lot. That's your lot, yeah.
It's not only the cows that seem happier, so are the farmers.
Chris and Mike say they get more milk from each cow.
Instead of 22 litres the traditional way,
they're now getting 32 litres - a massive increase.
Not only that but when they send the milk to their distributor
for testing, they discovered the milk is better quality milk.
They test it for fat and protein which is the creaminess of milk.
What's important about that?
We get paid on the creaminess.Right.
If it's not very creamy, they don't like the milk.
What's your level? What are you aiming for?
We're looking at 4% butterfat and 3.5% protein.
So, if you fall below that, you get paid less.Yes.
I'm impressed. This appears to be a win-win situation.
The cows seem happier, they produce more milk and creamier milk.
Maybe one day they'll even label it and we'll be able to buy robot milk.
Back to the barn.
Let's see how my cornflakes are getting on.
I've been making my own from scratch and it seems to me that so far
all I've been doing is taking all the goodness out.
These have been cooked for almost two hours.
Look at these.
So after all this time, still nothing that looks like cornflakes.
Unless...
Not quite cornflakes, but close.
These are a bit too wet and sticky.
In the factory they put them into huge driers
to get rid of all the water. I've got just what I need out the back.
A tumble dryer, that should do the job.
It seems a bit weird putting food
inside a tumble dryer, my mum would kill me.
I should be putting my socks and pants in here.
I feel a bit like a naughty boy doing this.
Shut the door.
My corn kernels are taking quite a battering.
I've cut it, cooked it, and I'm drying it.
Along the way I've lost most of its goodness.
By removing the nutritious germ I took out the vitamins.
Now it's time to add some of this goodness back into my cornflakes.
Vitamin B here from a local chemist.
In fact, cornflake manufacturers take this opportunity
to add sixdifferent B vitamins.
Some of them weren't even in the germ to start with!
They add salt and sugar for flavouring.
And I mustn't forget the iron, it's essential for the blood.
I had no idea the iron came like this. These are real iron filings!
Look at that, it's magnetic, incredible isn't it.
Pop some of that in.
They are food grade, of course.
There we are look, there's my iron and vitamin B smoothie.
My smoothie looks a bit unappetising.
But it will add nutrition and flavour to my cornflakes.
My grits should be nice and dry now.
Let's have a feel. Oh, yeah, they're lovely.
So, what I'm going to do is scoop them out
and turn these into some flakes.
In the factory, they use giant rollers
to squash the softened grits into flakes.
I'll keep going with my laundry theme.
After all this trouble, I hope the old mangle works.
Alternatively, it can go terribly wrong
and I end up with a big squished mess at the end.
This is the moment of truth.
Is it gonna work?
There they come, look at that.
Wow!
At first I thought they were coming through like little streaks,
but they are turning into fantastic little flakes.
Perfect, look at that. Last one and the last one is the best one.
Did you ever think it, making cornflakes.
Don't they look lovely?
My mangled cornflakes are just the right shape.
Perfect little flake, wafer-thin.
All I need to do now is toast them.
This should speed things up after all the messing about.
# And it burns, burns, burns
# Thering of fire
# The ring of fire... #
Now, that's nice and toasted, look at that.
A bit burnt around the edges, that's how I like them.
Look at that. My very own cornflake.
One last thing, though, my iron and vitamin B smoothie.
All the vitamins and minerals.
There.
Perfect! There we go, look at that.
My little bowl of cornflakes.
Do you know what, I'm quite proud of these.
I think they need some work.
I'm not sure I would want these for my breakfast!
Eggs on toast for me, I think.
Later we made up another batch with the same recipe.
Will they pass the taste test down on my farm?
Have a munch. Tell me what you think?Crunchy.
I can take criticism, so... Be brutal.
They are really hard. Hard. Too hard?
I think they're better. Do you?Yes.
Do you want me to be honest?
You don't like them. I don't like them.
They taste really bland. Really bland?
It's like the salt and sugar's missing.
And the score, out of 10. I'll give you an eight, I think.
Eight out of 10, that's not bad.
If you soak them sufficiently they will go down.
Leave them in milk overnight, you mean.Not quite as bad as that.
I have to agree they're not up to shop standard,
but what struck me was so much effort, goodness out and goodness in
goes into making a food that is ready to eat in an instant.
A spoonful of sugar. Have you ever wondered
how they make white sugar so sparkling white.
Do they use bleach?
Is there something in the way that it's made that I should worry about?
To try and make white sugar in the barn would just be too complicated,
so to find out more, I hit the road.
Now not many people know that over half our sugar
comes from this root vegetable, the home-grown sugar beet.
It only contains 17 per cent sugar, so how do we get from this to this?
And, get rid of all the other bits we don't need?
This is how, with a giant chemistry set.
We don't grate sugar-beet on to our cornflakes, it's not very sweet.
Hello, Bob.Hi, Jimmy.
How are you doing?All right.Now, Bob, is it quite a simple process?
Can I do it back home in the barn? Very unlikely.
British Sugar's, Bob Howe, says this process is so precise
Icouldn't do it in the barn.
He doesn't make sugar by simply chopping up the beet.
Can I taste one?
A little bit gritty. There's some sweetness there, but not a lot.
To refine our own sugar we'd have to stew the beet
in hot water first, like making tea.
But we still wouldn't have sugar.
It's still a long way from those white crystals
we buy inthe supermarket.
If you look at it, it's this yellow cloudy substance.
The cloudy yellow juice is full of bits in the beet
wedon't want on our cornflakes.
They use some clever chemistry to remove them.
How do you get sugar out of this solution now?
First I've got to remove impurities. Is that with some sort of filter?
Come on, don't you remember school chemistry?
Sorry, Bob, I think I must have been off that day.
Extracting sugar from beet uses a lot of science.
Here's the surprising bit. They use carbon-dioxide gas
and a solution of the mineral lime to clean it.
I add lime and I put carbon dioxide through it
and I precipitate calcium carbonate, and you'll know this as a chalk.
The lime and carbon dioxide Bob adds join together to make chalk.
As the chalk forms it traps the impurities.
When the chalk is filtered out, the sugar juice is much purer.
See, you never know what you might miss when you skip school.
You can see the chalk starting to settle.
That settling quite rapidly, as well.
You're left with the clear solution at the top, but it's not that clear.
I still wouldn't put that in my cup of tea.
To turn this into sugar crystals,
they the boil juice to evaporate some of the water.
This leaves behind a thick syrup of sugar.
If you get the temperature exactly right
and spin it in a centrifuge, something magical happens.
The syrup or the juice will start to separate from the crystals
and you'll be left with pure, white sugar.
Look at it change colour!
That is incredible. It just changes before your eyes. Look at that!
It's like snow!
If I put it in a bag now, that would that be a problem?
Yes, it would end up going in one big lump, Jimmy.
Let's dry it and bag it then. Let's go.
The sugar beet has been washed, chopped, steeped, filtered, boiled
and spun, just to get at that 17 per cent that we can use.
All we need to do nowis bag it up and get it in the shops.
The last item on my breakfast menu is instant coffee.
It says on the jar, 100 per cent coffee, but I have to admit
I've always assumed that they've added extra ingredients
like flavouring or chemicals to the real coffee.
The best way to find out what's in instant coffee is to make my own.
In the factory, the first thing they have to do is grind the beans
and brew up a drink of coffee.
Then something very clever happens in the instant coffee factory.
They have to get rid of all the water from the brewed coffee.
How do you dry out a drink?
It doesn't seem simple to dry out a drink,
even if I brew the coffee really strong to start with.
That is so strong it that makes your eyes water.
What is the trick, how do you dry out a drink and keep the flavour?
Just over half the instant coffee we drink in UK
is produced through a process called spray drying,
that's exactly what I'm going to try and do.
This should be fun. The experts have told me this probably won't work.
Industrial spray driers are seven storeys tall.
I love a dare, but don't try this at home.
These hot air guns will get the bins really hot.
Once it's really, really hot I'm gonna spray coffee in with this
paint sprayer and this will spray the coffee in a fine mist.
If the temperature is hot enough that fine mist, all the water
should evaporate out of it and I should end up with...
Dry coffee powder down in the bottom.
There is the possibility this could all go disastrously wrong.
Now, this does have some potential dangers.
One, it's going to get really, really hot.
And two, it could explode.
I want the liquid coffee spray to turn to powder inside these bins,
but whenever you create a large quantity
of fine powder in a confined space,
added with oxygen and a source of ignition,
there's a serious risk of explosion.
I've got all these risks right here in the barn.
So I'm gonna spray ever so timidly.
I just need to gauge the temperature.
It's got to reach well in excess of 100 Celsius in here,
the temperature water boils at, for the spray to quickly evaporate.
Wow, look at that.
It's a racing up. It's 150, 160...
That's now 200 degrees!
200 degrees is great.
It must be very hot so the water in the spray evaporates instantly
leaving just the coffee to drop to the bottom, hopefully as powder.
Right, I reckon it's time for my coffee.
I'm using a brew of super-strong fresh coffee, just like the factory.
On goes the compressor. There we go, see the coffee going along.
I'm gonna squirt that into the chamber. OK.
Now, I ama little bit worried
because this is the point where it could explode.
If I spray too much there could be an explosion,
but too little and I won't get my coffee powder.
There's a lot of the steam coming out of this
and an intense smell of coffee.
The steam is a good sign that the water is evaporating.
The sticky coffee could just be running down the sides.
This is madness, look at it. I've turned it into a coffee sauna.
I reckon, it's time to turn her off.
Wow, that is incredible.
That's dried coffee. Right.
It's still, very, very hot.
Look at that.
You see all the coffee stuck to the side of the bin there, look at it.
It's like brown snow.
The lower you get, the better it becomes.
Look at this stuff, it's caked in it.
Time to take the bottom off and see what we've got.
Look at this.
This has actually blown me away a bit.
My own coffee powder. Look at that.
There are two tests for instant coffee.
Here it goes.
Test one, does it dissolve in water?
Well, that's dissolved.
It took ages to get the water out, just so I can pour it back.
I'm quite nervous.
Test two, does it taste like coffee?
It tastes like coffee, but it hasn't got that body.
Now I'm gonna put a little bit more in just to do it some justice.
Do you know what, that would pass as a decent cup of coffee now.
My coffee in a jar, lovely.
Making breakfast from scratch, cornflakes, sugar,
robo milk and coffee has thrown up many surprises.
I'm amazed how processing even simple foods
requires so much ingenuity which has made me look at breakfast
in a completely different light.
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