Ferré & Consulting Blog (English Version)

Consumer goods giant Unilever has managed to break Nestle’s ice cream monopoly on the beaches of Rio de Janeiro, it has been reported.

For 30 years, Nestle has been the sole seller of ice cream in the city’s public spaces but now, Unilever has been granted a license to sell its products in major sites around the city, reports the Rio Times.

Unilever owns Kibon and it currently has around a 70 per cent share of the ice cream market in the Brazilian capital but this could increase its share.

Recently, the consumer goods giant announced it would be running a marketing campaign in the UK with fashion retailer ASOS.

Called the Temptation 100 campaign, it will centre around a game featuring clothing items specially selected by ASOS’ fashion team and is the second drive by Unilever on the retail website in recent months.

The winner of the game will receive ASOS items and runners-up will take home discount vouchers for Magnum Temptation.

Companies, Ice Creams ice cream monopoly, Nestle, Unilever

The price of chocolate is probably going to experience a huge hike after a large number of the world’s cocoa beans were speculatively bought out.

Prices have been driven up to their highest level since 1977 after a £658 million deal for 440,000 tonnes of cocoa was mooted.

The International Cocoa Organisation said: “Almost all chocolate companies have increased prices in the past two years.”

Deborah Doane, director of the World Development Movement, said: “Investment banks, like Goldman Sachs are making huge profits by gambling on the price of every day foods. But this is leaving people in the UK out of pocket and the poorest people in the world are starving.”

Recently, Nestle announced it would be launching a new variant of its famous Milkybar brand but with a twist – it is being aimed primarily at adults.

A new raisin and biscuit version of the children’s favourite will be produced at York’s Nestle factory.

Chocolate cocoa beans, price of chocolate

Chocolate manufacturers may benefit from automated testing for Salmonella, according to Swiss robotics supplier Xiril and Germany’s Biotecon Diagnostics.

Biotecon Diagnostics developed the foodproof RoboPrep+ Series to meet the need of a leading international confectionary manufacturer, who has now introduced the system into several of its factories for automated Salmonella testing.

The system combines Xiril’s liquid handling instrumentation with Biotecon’s magnetic preparation technology to enable automation of sample preparation and PCR setup. The results are generated in about 4.5 hours following the complete process of sample preparation, set up and post PCR steps.

The two companies maintain that the Salmonella testing system eliminates manual handling steps except in the initial loading of samples, reagents and consumables, while samples are traceable by barcode, and instruments are available with hood and UV/Air Cleaner.

A stepwise introduction of the technology for other parameters, such as E.coli or Listeria, is in development.

Chocolate, Food Safety Chocolate manufacturers, RoboPrep+ Series, Salmonella

Two bakery shortening products won Innovation Awards at the 2010 Institute of Food Technologists’ (IFT) Annual Meeting and Food Expo in Chicago last week.

Bunge North America collected an award for its Phytobake Shortening with Phytosterols while Caravan Ingredients won recognition for its Trancendim Emulsifiers for zero trans fat shortening.

Peter Clark, chairman of the award judges said: “It’s a co-incidence that two bakery products won awards but the technical innovation of both was outstanding.”

Functional shortening

Phytobake Shortening with Phystosterols from Bunge North America is a functional shortening for bakery applications. It allows the dilution of the amount of traditional hard fat or saturates and trans fats used in plastic shortenings by up to 46 per cent.

Using phytosterols to structure the shortening means that the finished product provides cardio protective benefits through lower cholesterol levels.

With zero grams of trans fat per serving the product is also said to improve the nutritional profile of food.

The shortenings are produced using enzymatic interestification which allows the re-arranging of the fatty acids to provide both structure and functionality at room temperature.

The process is also used to make margarines, baked goods, and confectionary with the texture, mouth feel, and smoothness similar to products made with saturated fats.

According to the judges’ citation: “Bakers using this ingredient can produce healthier sweet goods such as cookies, pie crust and cakes.”

Meanwhile, Caravan Ingredient’s Trancendim emulsifiers offers a reduced fat alternative for structuring fats and oils in a way that matches or improves the melting behaviour of common fat-based products.

Saturated fat

“The product line offers a variety of ways to make zero trans products with significant reductions in saturated fat,” claims the company. “This is achieved without a sacrifice in taste, mouth feel or flavour release.”

Trancendim has a range of applications including cakes, cookies, donuts, Danish pastries, icing, puff pastries and laminated products.

In addition to bakery shortenings, Innovation Awards were also given to Buhler Barth and Log5 Corporation for their Controlled Condensation Pasteurization Technology and to Handary for its Nisin A Natural Antimicrobial agent.

Five awards were made from 56 entries which were limited to companies exhibiting at the IFT trade event.

The judges based their award decisions on the degree of innovation, technical advancement, benefits to food manufacturers and consumers and scientific merit, said Clark.

Bakery, Technology bakery shortening products, Saturated fat

The article 24 of the regulation (EC) no. 1333/2008, which applies as of 20 July, requires that products containing the disputed “Southampton colours” need to bear a warning label “may have an adverse effect on activity and attention in children”.

The confectionery industry especially has to master the challenges linked to the growing consumer demand for more naturally formulated products and the requirements of the regulation (EC) No. 1333/2008 of 16 December 2008 on food additives.

Wild has added seven colouring foodstuffs to its Colors From Nature range in order to meet the growing demand for colours from natural sources. These are natural extracts and concentrates from plants, fruits or vegetables. Each of the ingredients corresponds to the type of fruit for which it is named.

New to the Wild colour portfolio are banana, mango, mandarin, redcurrant, elderberry and lime and allow for clean labelling without E-numbers. The new colouring foodstuffs are especially suited for use in confectionery such as hard candies, dragees, jelly gums and ice cream.

Confectionery, Food Safety, Ingredients confectionery, food additives, Southampton colours