DIY High Fructose Corn Syrup

I found the form of this project very appealing and educational, the box and layered information was an interesting learning tools to show the industrial nature of producing High Fructose Corn Syrup.

I was not so convinced by the additional video, as the presentational nature was quite stilted and dry and i was not so sure of the actual benefit of actually making the syrup myself.

Where as I found the box itself a clear rhetorical devise that along with some instructions would explain the issue clearly and elegantly. A well made prototype that could form the basis of a discussion about why this substance has found its way into many of our food stuffs and what its effect is on the body.

I guess what i felt was missing was the information for a debate, there is plenty of information available about the health risks of HFCS and you seem to have deliberately avoided pointing to any of it, this could be because you feel that is not your place but a clearer critical position on your part would have been interesting.

The demonstration of concept is cohesive and informative, while retaining a critical stance, quite a dance around some very challenging issues regarding industrialized food production. The 'ingredients behind the ingredients' as a basic premise sounds simple enough, but here it is handled with a form, straightforward tone based in consumer education.

The kit, in and of itself, can function in many contexts, from an actual DIY activity, to a potential exhibit that could, as the author states, deal with other processed food ingredients - bleached enriched white flour etc. It is in the repetition of the model hatched here in the first set of outcomes around HFCS that a systemic critique or 'lab food' becomes a useful tool in consumer education.

A potential avenue of exploration within this project could be to map the energy-intesive nature of these industrial food processes. I had no idea the corn would need to be simmered overnight - that's a HUGE input of energy into a type of corn that obviously does not want to be turned into food. In a basic comparison to truly edible corn that we grill, boil, heat to cook, what's the difference in energy input?

As for where this project goes, and what it becomes, the website itself could be more appropriately delivered as an animation? The serial nature of several investigations could greatly enhance the communicative effectiveness in the form of an exhibit or other type of installation - 'cooking' classes? It may be a more pointed form of communication to consider this and future kits to be 'one-offs' - functional prototypes used for demonstration/education, not manufacture and distribution.

I don't know if this was supposed to be funny, but it was in the best possible way. Visualising hidden industrial processes and ingredients via the conceit of DIY and home crafting has a lot of critical/comic potential.

You're playing it very straight, and it works, but is there room there for some unapologetic satire - projecting these corporate food frankensteins through some a hybrid home cooking / Heston Blumenthal style molecular gastronomy filter?

And I like the idea of a cookbook and youtube cooking show - my mouth is already watering... grandma's favourite monosodium glutamate, uncle George's rustic red#40! It would be a sensation!

This is an interesting, but slightly perplexing project.

I love that you have conducted your own research to uncover the production process, and shared it through strong and clear visual communication. Your graphic design and the production of the prototype kit are excellent. The videos are clear and informative. You've clearly explained that you wanted to understand what HG corn syrup is through the process of making it – excellent, thinking through making is a great approach to learning, especially for visually inclined people who can then visualise the process and results to help others learn.

What I don't understand is why other people would want to make this at home, using a DIY kit? I think perhaps you have positioned the communication aspect of this work incorrectly. The value of what you have done is in a documentary-style exposé of what goes into an ingredient present in much of our food, that we actually know very little about. This is an important message to communicate – I'm appalled by the chemical make-up of corn syrup, and I certainly wouldn't want a vial of sulphuric acid floating around my kitchen! There's something quirky and great about they way you've produced this essentially awful ingredient in a way that makes me want to buy the kit based on the aesthetic qualities of it (it looks fun!) but there's also something sinister about allowing home cooks the means to make an ingredient we should be trying to eradicate from our diets entirely. The DIY kit is the way you are able to show us what you did, but it should stay a piece of 'speculative design' – existing in theory but not put into production. The last thing the world needs is more people cooking with chemicals.

Keep up your investigative experiments into food, it's a great ongoing project and it looks like you're having fun doing it, which is an inspiration to makers everywhere.