Cloudy Apple Juice Contains Four Times the Concentration of Polyphenols Than Clear Juice

25/01/07 Cloudy apple juice is four times healthier than the clear variety, reports Sarah Scoffield in Chemistry & Industry, the magazine of the SCI.

Jan Oszmianski, leading a team at the Agricultural University of Wroclaw, Poland, compared clear and cloudy varieties of apple juice, and found that cloudy juice contains four times the concentration of polyphenols. Polyphenols are also found in dark chocolate, red wine and are widely reported to have anti-cancer activity. The research is published this month in the SCI's Journal of the Science of Food and Agriculture (DOI: 10.1002/jsfa.2707).

Lucy Ede, Head of Products at the juice company Innocent, said they already use cloudy apple juice in their products. "Cloudy juices taste better and have amazing body, which is important for us," she said. "But the fact that cloudy juices have more health benefits is extra exciting and definitely encourages us to use them."

Clear juice far outsells cloudy juice because of the perception by consumers that is purer. But it is the process of clarification that removes the beneficial compounds locked away in the apple pulp. Retailers also tend to favour clear juice because it has a longer shelf life than cloudy juice.