Ferré & Consulting Blog (English Version)

Several major food companies in Australia, including George Weston Foods, Goodman Fielder Baking and Cereal Partners Worldwide, have agreed to reduce the amount of salt in their bread and breakfast cereals as part of a collaborative effort with the government called the Food and Health Dialogue.

Mark Butler, the parliamentary secretary for health in Australia, said George Weston Foods, Goodman Fielder Baking, Allied Mills, Cripps Nubake, Woolworths, Coles and ALDI were among the manufacturers and retailers who have agreed to reduce sodium across bread products to 400 mg per 100 g by the end of 2013. Meanwhile, Kellogg Co., Sanitarium, Cereal Partners Worldwide, Woolworths, Coles and ALDI were among those who agreed to reduce the sodium content of ready-to-eat breakfast cereals by 15% over four years.

In total, the manufacturers and retailers who have agreed to take part in the initiative represent more than 80% of the market share for bread products and approximately 60% of the market share for R-T-E cereal in Australia.

“Agreed targets give industry a level playing field and certainty on expectations,” Mr. Butler said. “Bread and breakfast cereals are the first of several food categories being prioritized by the Food and Health Dialogue to improve Australian diets.”

Bakery, Health australia, bread, reduce, salt

Cargill, Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA, continues to expand its global reach with the opening of a flavor manufacturing plant in Pinghu, China. The facility, which will allow Cargill to serve customers with flavors for beverage, dairy, confectionery and bakery applications, as well as manufacturing and supply options, will complement the company’s Shanghai flavor application laboratory opened in 2007.

Cargill said the new site will join a production facility in Bangalore, India, as well as application centers in Shanghai; Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia; and Bangalore, in forming the base from which the company expects to serve the growing Asian market.

“This latest venture demonstrates our commitment to being a worldwide partner for our flavors customers as we now have one or more manufacturing sites in each regional market,” said Peter Michielsen, head of Cargill Flavor Systems. “Crucially, the plant will enable us to react even faster to the needs of our customers, whether local Chinese manufacturers, or global customers with sites in China. It also strengthens our worldwide flavor network where local knowledge becomes global knowledge, especially in terms of sharing expertise or spotting the rise and fall of consumer trends. At Pinghu, in particular, we will apply our knowledge in connecting base raw materials with specialty ingredients such as flavors.

“Our flavor business has a strong competitive advantage. It can — and does — draw upon the extensive knowledge we have built up across our food ingredients portfolio that also includes juices, starches and sweeteners, edible oils, texturizers, malt, cocoa and chocolate. This will enable us to provide original and often unique taste solutions to our customers.”

Cargill said the new plant has been built on the same site as the company’s existing starches and sweeteners plant.

Companies Cargill, China, flavor manufacturing

Researchers in Finland have discovered lactic bacteria that naturally produce hydrocolloids in wheat bread using sourdough, and could be used to make additive-free products that meet taste and texture requirements.

Sourdough always contains lactic acid bacteria, which are responsible for the fermentation process. But Kati Katina, senior research scientist at VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland led a three-year project to screen over 100 other cereal and food-based microbes to find out which ones work in a wheat matrix and can yield helpful hydrocolloids. The first phase of the project involved a modelling system.

Once the team had narrowed down the potential candidates, it progressed to the baking stage. Katina told  that the team was “quite lucky” to find four or five lactic bacteria that helped the mechanical processability of the dough, improved shelf life, and increased volume. The taste was mild and lacked the pungency often associated with sourdough bread.

The effect is attributed to the production of exopolysaccharides during the fermentation process, which act as coagulants and emulsifiers.

In a report on the work published in the journal Food Microbiology, Katina and her team said that Weissella confusa was identified as a strain with particular potential. Others from the general Leuconostoc, Lactobacillus, and Weissella were seen to produce exopolysaccharides, but with some strains the positive technical results were marred by acidification. This was not the case with W confusa.

The indication is that the addition of the lactic bacteria early on means there is no need for other additives to be used in the manufacturing process, in order to achieve the same high quality results.

The project as funded by the Finnish Funding Agency for technology and Innovation Tekes, as well as by VTT. Katina said that since it is a nationally funded project, the findings have been made public and some bakeries are already putting them to use in their projects.

However Katina’s work is not yet over: There is potential to use the technology for producing ingredients for other cereal products and foods, such as extruded snacks, she said.

She is now investigating the nutritional aspects of the technology. Sourdough already has a reputation for having a low glycaemic index, and it is thought that the formation of the hydrocolloids could enhance this effect.

Bakery bread additive, dough, lactic acid bacteria

The European Food Safety Authority published new dietary reference values (DRVs) for carbohydrates, sugar, fibre, fats and water confirming proposals made last year. The final levels have drawn criticism from some scientists.

The EU risk assessor was asked by the European Commission to update DRVs for a slate of nutrients on the basis of the most recent scientific evidence, as the last time these were set was in 1993. The values released today are the first of three batches: advice on protein and energy is in the works, and EFSA will start working on vitamins and minerals later this year.

EFSA held public consultations on the new DRVs prior to confirming them. The values will now be used as an evidence base underpinning nutritional policies, public health targets, and consumer info and education programmes.

Carbs, sugar and fibre

EFSA’s advice on total carbohydrates is that intake should comprise between 45 and 60 per cent of total energy intake for both adults and children. A daily intake of 25g of fibre is recommended for normal bowel function in adults; EFSA has also recognised evidence linking fibre to reduced risk of cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes, and its role in weight management.

However it could not find sufficient evidence to support the role of the glycaemic index and glycaemic load in maintaining weight and preventing diet-related diseases.

No upper limit for sugars has been set, either, because of insufficient evidence and health effects are a matter of what foods are consumed and how often, rather than the amount of sugar per se. The panel does recognise that there is “good evidence that frequent consumption of foods high in sugars increases the risk of tooth decay”. But says policy makers should consider evidence for consumption patterns of sugar-containing foods when making national nutrition recommendations.

Balancing fats

Overall, EFSA says fat intakes should range between 20 and 35 per cent of total energy for adults (the values for children are adjusted to take account of their developmental needs).

But evidence for impact of different kinds of fat is recognised, such as the link between saturated and trans fats and blood cholesterol levels. Here too, though, EFSA leaves it to national policy makers to decide how to couch the message that mono- and poly-unsaturated fatty acids are better than trans and saturated.

In the case of long-chain omega-3 fatty acids, however, it is more prescriptive. It says a daily intake of 250mg for adults “may reduce the risk of heart disease”. However academics and industry have been lobbying for far higher values than this – ideally over 500mg a day.

Following the publication of the proposed values, a 22-strong of scientists wrote to EFSA to ask it to “reconsider its conclusions and advice on omega-3 fatty acids afresh, right from the beginning.”

The scientists also objected to the proposal that ALA (alpha-linolenic) acid is a “viable precursor” to longer-chain DHA and EPA fatty acids. EFSA’s final opinion states that “ALA cannot be synthesised by the body, is required to maintain metabolic integrity, and is therefore considered to be an essential fatty acid”.

It proposes an adequate intake level of 0.5 per cent of energy, but says there is not enough evidence to set an average requirement, a lower threshold intake or a population reference intake. It also sees no need for a tolerable upper intake level, as it says there is no convincing evidence of any detrimental health effects.

The final DRV included in the current batch is for water. EFSA says 2 litres a day is considered adequate for women, and 2.5 litres for men.

Food Safety, Health dietary reference values, EFSA, fat intakes, sugar intakes