Page 18 - Food&Drink July 2019

INGREDIENTS
✷ VITAL FOODS NUTRACEUTICALS
TAKE CENTRE STAGE
Nutraceuticals provide medicinal and health benefits through functional foods and beverages. They can reduce risks of things like heart disease and improve your skin, mood and sleep.
Vitafoods Asia will showcase key trends in Singapore in September. Vitafoods says key consumption
trends include cannabidiols or CBD. Most nutraceuticals promote feeling better over time, while CBD is an immediate ‘feel the benefit’ product. APAC is predicted to account for 23 per cent of worldwide spend by 2022.
Low carb, high protein is also driving an increase in plant-based flours and upcycling food byproducts, like whey protein.
Healthy ageing is increasingly less about being old. The ‘silver’ consumer may be the foremost demographic for anti-ageing products but those aimed at healthy ageing spans all generations. Food products that improve bone, joint and brain health as well as proactively address other age-related health concerns are on the rise.
And the fastest growing segment of all is functional beverages. Energy drinks still monopolise the space, but kombucha, RTD tea, coffee and enhanced water are the fasted growing subsegments.
Vitalfoods will be held in Singapore from 25-26 September. Registrations are at www.vitafoodsasia.com.
18 | Food&Drink business
Tapping into the trend
With new trends come new products. Research and innovation can result in fun or health breakthroughs, Kim Berry highlights a couple of them.
dairy and grain simultaneously. The metabolites can include short-chain fatty acids, phenolic compounds, intact proteins, peptides, exopolysaccharides, oat fibre and glucans.
FOOD AS MEDICINE
Food as medicine is not a new concept, but for consumers
it is becoming a much more dominant mindset when choosing what to eat. The latest superfood to hit the scene is the Queen Garnet Plum.
Bred in Queensland, a Victoria University and University of Southern Queensland clinical trial found the plum’s nectar reduced blood pressure, fasting glucose, insulin and LDL (bad) cholesterol levels in overweight and obese patients who consumed it over three months. There was a gradual and sustained reduction in blood pressure within six weeks of consuming the nectar, which continued to lower over the trial period by about 10mmHg, a highly significant level for cardiovascular.
The researchers attribute the effects to the known benefits of the plum’s anthocyanins – powerful antioxidants found in red, blue and purple fruits and vegetables. Queen Garnet plums contain up to seven times more than other plums. ✷
UPCYCLED FOOD
As consumer awareness grows about waste and how to reduce it, utilising food waste is on the rise. Possibly one of the most exciting examples of this is the collaboration between Seven Bro7hers Brewery and Kellogg’s in the UK. In 2018, it developed the Throw Away IPA, which used Corn Flakes rejected by Kellogg’s for being too big or small, overcooked, uncoated or discoloured. This year the range has expanded with Sling
It Out Stout, made with 80 kilograms of Coco Pops instead of malted barley and the double-hopped Cast Off Pale Ale. It uses 80 kilograms of Rice Krispies instead of malted barley.
THE MIGHTY OAT
Oats are tagged as one of the “it” ingredients in the plant-based beverage category at the moment.
At this year’s Naturally Good Expo in Sydney (see story on page 12-13), US food consultant Bob Burke said oats are on the rise as a dairy alternative, with supply chain issues the “only thing holding it back”.
The PepsiCo-owned Quaker Oats Company launched its oat
beverage earlier this year. PepsiCo patented a
process to ferment oats and dairy milk together, to produce
a drinkable or spoonable product with unique metabolites. Oats and dairy are certainly
not a new combination, but PepsiCo says its
patented process allows the bacterial culture to act on the