BEFORE YOU BEGIN
Gather the information you need for creating an Ingredient, such as a spec sheet, certificate of analysis or other documentation with the nutrition breakdown of your Ingredient.
Obtain a login and password from your admin so you can use Genesis Foods.
1. First things first
Log in to Genesis Foods with your email and password.
On the Dashboard, click New Ingredient.
2. Name Your Ingredient
Type the name of your Ingredient in the Name text field using the established naming best practices agreed on by your organization. The Name entry can accommodate letters and numbers. Example: Vegetable, raw, sweet potato, medium.
Optional: Add an Alias.
Type any alphanumeric combination in the text field. Aliases will be used in the Ingredient Statement and on reports. Example: Cauliflower Rice w/Veggies
Optional: Select a Tag for your Ingredient:
Click in the Tags field
Enter search terms by typing on top of Search for a tag
Click a tag to add it to your Ingredient.
Optional: Add a Product or Supplier.
Type the Product or Supplier names in the fields. These can be used later for searching.
3. Enter the Ingredient’s Weight
This is the weight of the ingredient for which you will enter nutrient amounts. Ninety-nine percent of the time, this will be 100 grams, but you should use whatever is on your spec sheet, certificate of analysis or other ingredient nutrient documentation. 100 grams has been pre-populated for you.
To enter a weight and unit of measure, type in the Weight amount and select the Unit.
Optional: Add a Volume Conversion.
If you are creating a liquid Ingredient and your nutrients are entered per weight, here is where you will enter the Volume Conversion. The program will use this conversion to display an appropriate liquid amount on the Label. You can only add one liquid conversion per ingredient.
Click Add Volume Conversion
Enter the quantity and the volume measure
Enter the equivalent amount per gram weight.
Click Save.
Optional: Add a Unit Conversion.
If you want to add common household or other non-weight measures (for both liquids and solids), you would do that under Unit Conversions
Click Add Unit Conversion
Enter the quantity and the household measure
Enter the equivalent amount per gram weight.
Click Save.
4. Populate the Nutrients
The values entered here will be used to calculate the per-serving amounts for the nutrients in the Ingredient’s containing Recipe.
Here is where you add your Ingredient’s nutrient data. We recommend adding as much as possible. At the very least, you should populate the nutrients that are required on a Label.
Select U.S. Label Nutrients Mandatory. The U.S. Label Nutrients Mandatory list is the list of 15 nutrients required on a U.S. Nutrition Facts.
Click in the Value column for Calories
Enter the number of Calories.
Click in the Value column for Protein
Type in the quantative value for Protein in grams. There is no need to enter the unit of measure. Notice that the %DV is automatically calculated.
Continue in the same manner for the remaining nutrients.
Note: You can also enter the Adult %DV for your nutrient and the quantative amount will be calculateed.
5. Adjust the Allergens
Regulations require the declaration of any allergens present in your food product. For this reason and, more importantly, for consumer-safety purposes, Genesis Foods initially assumes that all Ingredients contain all allergens. Your job is to determine when an allergen can be moved to the Not Present bucket or, in some cases, the May Contains bucket.
When you have determined an allergen is not present in your Ingredient, you can move it to the Not Present bucket. If you want to declare an allergen that may be present during processing, you can move it to the May Contain bucket.
To move an allergen, do one of the following:
Click the right arrow
Click and hold the grip
icon
Notice that when you move an allergen to the Not Present bucket, its alerts disappear.
Those allergens that remain in the Contains bucket will appear on your allergen statement. And those that remain in the May Contain bucket will appear in the cautionary statement. In both cases, you must select the type or species of shellfish, fish and tree nuts.
To display a specific type or species
Click Shellfish, Fish or Tree Nut.
From the list, select the specific type or species. Use the type-ahead to narrow the selections.
Once you have selected the species, the alert will disappear and the species or type will appear in the preview in alphabetical order.
Optional: Copy your preview statement
Once you have set up your Contains (and/or May Contain) statement, you can copy either or both statements to the clipboard as plain text.
You’re done
By completing the above tasks, you now have an Ingredient you can use to build a Recipe and its compliant Label. The remaining functions — Notes, Images, Attachments and Custom Fields — are not required for labeling and packaging, but are here to help you customize and organize your foods.
Once you have finalized your Ingredient, you can click Approve. Genesis Foods will save the ingredient in that state, and you will not be able to edit the Approved version If, however, you open this Approved Ingredient and make any changes to it, Genesis Foods will automatically create a new editable version and call it something like: “V1. Draft.”