Ingredients Butter and
Ingredients Butter and Beyond - The Rise of Alternative Fats in the Bakery Fat plays a crucial role in shaping our food experience, exerting a profound influence on both taste and texture. It adds depth and richness of flavor to dishes, elevating the overall sensory encounter of dining. From the flakiness of pastries to the tenderness of meat, fat impacts the texture and structure of a diverse range of culinary creations. However, in the collective strive to reduce reliance on animalbased ingredients and embrace more plant-based foods, finding the right fat is essential. Alternative proteins have garnered much interest over the last few years, but people tend to forget that fats and oils are an equally important part of a healthy diet. Identifying plant-based fats that mimic the characteristics of animal fats can help recreate familiar flavors and textures while aligning with plant orientated dietary choices. These fats contribute to the mouthfeel, creaminess, and indulgence we associate with certain dishes. Moreover, there is a demand for plantbased fats that can strike the balance between offering culinary pleasure and nutritional well-being. Itai Cohen, Gavan co-founder and CEO, with his R&D team Fat is a key ingredient in bakery products as it plays a definitive role in enhancing volume and rich flavor. Most common fats today contain high levels of saturated fatty acids; dairy butter contains 63% saturated fat. Animal-derived ingredients have been prevalent in pastries. Despite the growing use of vegetable fats instead of butter, nothing quiet matches the taste, texture, and smoothness that real butter confers. This presents a clear challenge for both the industry and its customers. Recently more and more consumers are looking for plant-based options for various reasons including nutrition, animal welfare, clean label, and sustainability. In response pastry chefs are faced with the task of adjusting ingredients to meet this demand. It starts with gaining an understanding of how fats and oils interact with the other ingredients. Once these underlying mechanisms become clear, the challenge lies in finding a plant-based fat solution with the same workability as dairy-based butter while minimizing the need for added ingredients including allergens in the reformulation process. It’s time to rethink pastry as we know it. We no longer rely solely on dairy butter to create amazing-tasting pastry applications. There is now a highly credible alternative. Our main vision is to reduce pastries’ dependency on animal-based products. Gavan is currently exploring the potential of its technology to replace the fat component in various food applications beginning with butter for the bakery industry. Alternatives such as FaTRIX enable bakers to replace dairy butter without forfeiting functionality. These solutions help reduce saturated fat by 80% for each unit of fat replaced and still retain the sensory properties of saturated fats. Another advantage is the flavor. Butter tends to dominate other flavors. FaTRIX has been developed with a neutral taste, enabling chefs to highlight and bring out the flavors they desire in their creations. By exploring and experimenting with alternative fats, we can continue to enjoy delicious and satisfying cuisine while promoting a healthier sustainable and compassionate food system. fmt 14 food Marketing & Technology • August 2023
Ingredients IFT FIRST Focuses on the Future of Food by Donna Berry Pandemic, natural disasters, inflation and war, these are just some of the global crises that have impeded progress across the food science community at a time when new solutions are most needed to feed the growing global population. These challenges were addressed at IFT FIRST, the annual meeting of the Institute of Food Technologists (IFT), a nonprofit scientific organization committed to advancing the science of food and its application across the global food system, which was held on July 16 to 19, 2023, in Chicago, Illinois. IFT FIRST means Food Improved by Research, Science and Technology. It is IFT’s response to the transformative nature of the global food system. This year’s theme “Innovation in a Time of Crisis: Can We Future-Proof the Food System?” was the focus of this year’s scientific program and exposition. “Our global food supply is facing new challenges that require new solutions,” said Christie Tarantino- Dean, chief executive officer of IFT. “Our top global food-science leaders recognize this and are guiding the technology and innovation movement that is driving our food systems forward today.” The opening keynote address on “Embedding Innovation into Everyone’s DNA” was delivered by Duncan Wardle, former head of innovation and creativity at Disney. His words set the stage for the event. “Don’t let ‘no, because’ be the first words out of your mouth,” said Wardle. “When a team member presents a new idea, respond ‘yes, and’ in order to encourage innovation. “You can program AI to paint the Mona Lisa, and it might be able to recreate it perfectly stroke by stroke, but it’d be incredibly difficult to program a machine to possess the curiosity and creativity that prompted Da Vinci to paint her in the first place,” according to Wardle. “While AI may one day replicate the core human traits, I don’t believe it’s coming anytime soon. The next decade belongs to those of us who can tap into our creativity, our intuition, our curiosity and our imagination, and leverage these uniquely human skills to disrupt and innovate the next wave of incredible discoveries.” One such discovery is on the fasttrack within ingredient technology. It’s the upcycling of side streams of food manufacturing into valuable, edible products. “Agricultural and food processing by-products, such as fruit and vegetable skins, pulp, seeds and stems can be defined as low-value or scrap materials, written off in the manufacturing plant ledgers, Senior couple jogging_©BAZA Production_shutterstock_1629522379 source BENEO food Marketing & Technology • August 2023 15
