IMPROVING STRUCTURE AND FLAVOUR PERFORMANCE FOR HEALTHIER PLANT-BASED FOOD USING INNOVATIVE APPROACHES
31 Mar 2022
BACKGROUND
In the last few years, the global plant-based food market has experienced a considerable growth and it is projected to reach $40 billion by 2025. Driven by consumers awareness for more sustainable and healthier products, as well as animal welfare, the alternatives for meat and dairy products are multiplying worldwide. Besides, latest coronavirus pandemic issue increased consumers wariness about animal products, and it is likely to have a significant impact on plant-based food grocery sales.
Though plant-based food products convey a healthy image to consumers, reality is often different, and the current market offer for these products is not consistent with this image. Indeed, the first obstacle for consuming plant-based food is the taste. To overcome this barrier, numerous ingredients and additives are added to enable a perfect imitation of animal-based products, and to achieve good organoleptic properties.
But this leads to the second obstacle for consuming plant-based food, which can be attributed to nutrition & ingredients labels. As consumers are paying more and more attention to the nutritional and health quality of their food, food industry is seeking for new clean label ingredients, which are capable of improving texture and mouth feel of the products along with improved taste. This behavior is even strengthened by new labels and phone applications such as the Nutriscore and Yuka.
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CHALLENGE & SCOPE
Main issue in plant-based food development is the functionality of plant proteins (e.g. protein solubility, structure formation, water holding capacity etc.), which often leads to lower texture, structure, juiciness and flavor performance in the end-products. That’s why food additives such as artificial preservatives, flavors, colors etc. are often added to address these technological problems since they provide the required characteristics.
This project thus aims at providing innovative strategies for reducing ingredients & additives list of plant-based food in particular for vegan desserts and beverages, while achieving satisfying organoleptic properties.
Activities will assess:
• Synergies between natural and local ingredients* (proteins with e.g. starch and fibers) in food models;
• The effect of physical processes (e.g. high pressure processing, extrusion) on plant-based ingredients and ingredient mixtures (protein + starch, protein + fibers; protein + starch + fibers) from peas and oats;
• Impact of synergies between ingredients, and processes on:
o The molecular structure of plant proteins;
o The nutritional properties of plant proteins and plant-based food models (e.g. in-vitro digestibility, label);
o The functional properties of plant proteins and plant-based food models (e.g. solubility, emulsifying properties, texture);
o The sensory properties of plant proteins, protein mixtures and plant-based food models.
*e.g. pea proteins, pea fibres, pea starch
EXPECTED IMPACTS
This project aims to deliver new solutions to the food & beverage industry for providing healthier plant-based food with less ingredients and less additives. It will have a beneficial impact on the environment as it intends to use local ingredients instead of other ingredients and additives coming from distant countries. What’s more, it is expected to provide local plant protein ingredients from peas and oats in admixture with starch or fibers with the same functional quality as proteins from remote origins (soya). The economic potential is great, considering all the stakeholders affected by the project. Ingredients suppliers can benefit from new solutions for improving the functional properties of their products (plant proteins), food industries can benefit from functionally improved ingredients and from new technological solutions for developing products with less ingredients and less additives and provide labels which reassure consumers. Farmers and food companies providing plant raw materials will also benefit from this project. This represents, together with an increased awareness towards plant-based food & healthy food in western societies, the market potential of the research.
PARTNERS
This is a European collaborative project framed on the 30th Cornet call. 2 partners from 2 countries participate in this project.
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Ing. Pauline Fauquet
Celabor
Project Leader – Food technologies and Nutrition
Tel.: +32 87 32 24 54
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Dr. Susanne Naumann
Fraunhofer-Institute for Process Engineering and Packaging (IVV)
Group Leader Food Ingredients
Tel.: +49 8161 491-410
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