How popular is healthy food?

More people in Malaysia are eating consciously and healthily. 2023 research by Precision Business Insights shows that Malaysia’s consumers are buying healthier products, such as foods containing whole grains and less sugar.

According to Business Research Insights, the health and wellness food market projection is at a CAGR of 7.23% from 2021 to 2027, 

Are you thinking of setting up a healthy food business? Here are 7 kitchen tools you’ll need to make it work. 
 

1. Vegetable Cutter 

Vegetables and plant-based foods are a key feature of healthy food. A vegetable cutter is a must-have for your health and wellness food business. 

As a health food business, you’ll probably process and prepare a large volume and variety of vegetables daily. Manually chopping, peeling, and dicing vegetables is tiring, risky, and time-consuming. Fast and manual chopping also increases the risk of injuries, especially if your employees haven’t undergone kitchen safety training yet.

The OTN vegetable cutter is a type of continuous feed food processor that can handle long hours of work. It is made of stainless steel and has stainless steel blades that offer 6 different cutting styles for a variety of dishes and products: diced, sliced (2mm), sliced (4mm), cut wave, round wire and cube. It’s also easy to use - just wash and place the vegetables into the processing machine.

Still not sure if you need a vegetable processor?
These are some examples of health food businesses that will highly benefit from automated vegetable preparation:

• Healthy plant-based or vegetable snack manufacturers
• Salad bars
• Healthy home food businesses
• Healthy sandwich shops
• Organic food and beverage businesses
• Vegetarian food businesses
• Vegetable-based juice businesses
• Acai and poke bowl businesses
   

2. Convection Oven

Baking is a healthier way to cook foods than frying. Why? Frying removes most nutrients from food, and food that’s fried also absorbs the most fat from oil.

On the other hand, baking uses less oil, so the food doesn’t absorb as much oil as frying. Baking also retains more nutrients. It even enhances some existing nutrients in food. Lastly, baked food is easier to digest than fried food since it doesn’t have as many fats and oil. 

We recommend using a convection oven for the healthiest and tastiest baking. Convection ovens are multipurpose kitchen heroes. You can use them for baking, roasting, grilling, steam cooking, reheating pre-cooked items, or defrosting. Convection ovens cook and bake faster too - heat transfers through the air or steam that circulates around the food inside, providing much faster heating.

The best part? Convection ovens are better at giving your food a tasty, brown appearance due to caramelisation. Perfect for baking or cooking fresh, tender vegetables and lean meats like fish.

 

3. Blender and Orange Juice Dispenser

What would a healthy food business be without some healthy drinks? Healthy drinks include fresh fruit juice, blended fruit and vegetable smoothies, and low-fat milkshakes.

Since most of these drinks require blending hard and soft ingredients, you’ll need a robust kitchen blender. Kitchen blenders will chop, crush and blend your fruits, vegetables and nuts into a puree containing juice and fibre. Add milk and yoghurt to make a milkshake.

Kitchen blenders are versatile food processors. You can use kitchen blenders to make other things besides juice, smoothies and milkshakes:

• Soup
• Dips and sauces
• Home-made nut butter

Do nutrients get destroyed in the blending process? No. Blenders don’t take away any nutritional value from your food. In fact, by crushing the food up, blenders make it easier for the body to digest and absorb more nutrients from fruits and vegetables. 

You can serve fruit and vegetable purees as they are with vitamin-rich juice and fibres. Fibres have many benefits, including maintaining a healthy digestive system. 

To make juice, pour the puree through a strainer to remove the fibres. You can also use a fresh orange juice extractor and dispenser to squeeze and dispense pure orange juice.

 

4. Fish Steamer 

Fish is a lean protein that is low in saturated fats and high in omega-3 fatty acids, vitamins, minerals, and more. There are many ways to cook fish, but steamed fish is one of the healthiest options. 
 

Steaming doesn’t use oil in the cooking process. Steam also dissolves and removes fats from meat and fish. It also retains the most nutrients out of all cooking methods - a study found that steaming caused the lowest loss of important nutrients in vegetables. Using less fats, oil, and cholesterol makes steaming one of the healthiest cooking methods.

 

A fish steamer preserves fish freshness and nutrients while gently steaming it. The resulting dish is full of natural flavour, low in fat, and light on the stomach.

 

5. Bread Proofer 

Want to start a healthy bread business? Here’s some good news for you: a 2023 study on Malaysia’s bakery products by Precision Insights found that bread and bread rolls have the largest market share, with a projected RM 176.0 million opportunity in 2029 from 2023.

Healthy, convenient bread options include whole grain, whole wheat and wholemeal bread loaves and rolls. They’re high in fibre and benefit your digestive system, while being easy to prepare and eat.

When you’re baking bread from scratch, you’ll usually need to use a bread proofer at some point. Bread proofers are used in the second-last step of the bread production process (before baking) for fermenting and rising. That’s how you get fluffy, large loaves and rolls of bread!

A bread proofer keeps your fermenting bread warm so the yeast can rise. Different types of bread have different conditions for the best proofing. Ask your commercial kitchen equipment supplier for more specific instructions.

 

6. Salad Counter Chiller Freezer Bar

We mentioned the need for a vegetable cutter earlier on in this article. You’ll probably use those vegetables for cooking, juicing, baking and other dishes. But if you’re serving them raw in salads or sandwiches, you need food storage to keep them fresh.

Use a counter freezer salad bar to display fresh salad ingredients. The counter format lets you easily choose and select ingredients from a wide and flat layout. Keep raw meat and vegetables separately to prevent cross-contamination.
 

7. Kitchen Storage

Finally, you’ll need robust kitchen storage for all your kitchen tools and cooking utensils. This includes kitchen racks, food prep counters and cutting boards. Add some compartment sinks to wash food and dishes.

OTN Machinery’s kitchen storage solutions include stainless steel racks and work tables. Stainless steel is arguably the best kitchen equipment material because it’s heat-resistant, waterproof, and strong.
 

Conclusion

Healthy living and eating have become even more important in a post-pandemic world. Healthy food businesses can help customers find nutritious and convenient dining options amidst their busy lifestyles. Turn your vision for a healthy food business into reality with equipment from OTN Machinery. 

OTN Machinery Sdn Bhd is Malaysia’s biggest kitchen equipment supplier. With 25+ years of experience helping food businesses in Malaysia and overseas, our equipment is compliant with local safety regulations and maintenance standards.