Principles of Food Engineering
Principles of Food Engineering applies engineering principles to analyze food process operations, covering psychrometrics, material and energy balances, fluid flow, heat transfer, and dehydration.
Summary
Past student reviews · Arnoldo Lopez-Hernandez
Exams were reported to take 2.5 to 3 hours to complete, with one student noting the grading criteria was strict.
What you’ll be able to do
Apply the conservation equations (mass, energy, momentum) to food processes including those with reactions and unsteady state operation
Apply the transport equations (mass, energy, and momentum, including food rheology) to food processes
Apply concepts of thermodynamics to food systems: 1st law, 2nd law, gas laws, and psychometrics
Explain the theoretical basis for rheology and use rheological approaches to solve problems in food processing and product quality evaluation
Source: UW Guide
Grade history
↗All recorded terms · compare terms & instructors
Prerequisites
Course mapFOOD SCI 301, (MATH 217 or 221), and (PHYSICS 103, 201, or 207)
“Used by” includes alternatives; linked courses may have other requirements. This is a best-effort interpretation; check the catalog requirements above.
Prerequisite text tree
- All of
- FOODSCI 301
- Any of
- MATH 217
- MATH 221
- Any of
Professors
Spring 2027No instructors recorded for this selection.
Historical instructors & teaching patterns
ARNOLDO LOPEZ-HERNANDEZ is recorded teaching in Fall 2019, Fall 2020, Fall 2021, Fall 2022, Fall 2023, Fall 2024, Fall 2025. Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.
MARK ETZEL is recorded teaching in Fall 2009, Fall 2010, Fall 2011, Fall 2012, Fall 2013, Fall 2014, Fall 2015, Fall 2016, Fall 2017, Fall 2018. Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.
Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.
Calendar & sections
Spring 2027Schedule loads here as you scroll.
| Section | Mode | Enrolled / capacity | Waitlist |
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Times are Central. Select a meeting for details; export includes recorded dates for the selected sections.
Meeting source records
Student experience
the class
Past student reviews · Arnoldo Lopez-Hernandez
Students described the instructor as approachable and caring, noting he is always available to answer questions and work through material with them.
Recent recorded grades — Fall 2023: 2.64 GPA, 27.3% A/AB (n=11 letter grades); Fall 2024: 2.55 GPA, 22.7% A/AB (n=22 letter grades); Fall 2025: 2.72 GPA, 30.4% A/AB (n=23 letter grades).
difficulty & workload
Past student reviews · Arnoldo Lopez-Hernandez
Exams were reported to take 2.5 to 3 hours to complete, with one student noting the grading criteria was strict.
Past student reviews · Arnoldo Lopez-Hernandez
One student found the exams hard but stated that the class curved grades so that students who tried would pass.
Topics
- Properties of gases and vapors, psychrometrics, and material and energy balances
- Fluid flow, heat transfer, microwave heating, and mass transfer
- Packaging film permeability and dehydration
- Food rheology
Skills
- Applying mass, energy, and momentum conservation equations to food processes
- Applying transport equations including food rheology to solve processing problems
- Applying thermodynamic concepts such as the first and second laws and gas laws to food systems
- Using rheological approaches to evaluate food processing and product quality
Grades
Latest available · Fall 2025— not enough history to project Spring 2027.
Grade distribution · % of letter grades
Grades over time
Through Fall 2025
More grade details Grade mix, volume & source data
Not enough comparable courses for Spring 2027 in UW–Madison.
Sources & history
Catalog & offerings
Descriptions, prerequisites, and recorded course offerings.
Catalog observation history
Observations at scan time; dates do not imply when a catalog change took effect.
Selected offering source records
No offering records for the selected term.
Raw records
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Student reviews
Original comments behind the course and instructor summaries.
Read original reviews
Grade history
Recorded grade distributions by term, section, and instructor.
Explore recorded gradesRecorded 2026-10-14
Model outputs & technical records
LLM outputs across runs
Full model traces
Recorded model configuration, reasoning, and tool conversations.
Model & dataset provenance
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