Food forensics: methods for determining the authenticity of foodstuffs

Verifying the description of food in terms of its composition, processing or origin is challenging, but important in protecting consumers and enforcing food law. The UK Food Standards Agency’s authenticity programme has funded a large number of projects to utilise different technologies for determining the authenticity of foodstuffs. This review highlights the practical challenges faced in developing authenticity methods, and focuses on the techniques that have been the most successful (stable isotope analysis, genomics and proteomics), giving examples of their application.