FiE 2024: Alland & Robert spotlights acacia fiber for improved Nutri-Score
10 Dec 2024 | Alland & Robert
Acacia gum is more than a food additive — it’s a fiber that can improve the nutritional profile of foods. Isabelle Jaouen, R&D director at Alland & Robert, explains how the ingredient can be used in new formulations to lower sugar and fat while increasing fiber. It is also suitable for a range of special diets, like vegan, keto or low-FODMAP lifestyles.
This is Missy Green with Nutrition Insight.
I'm here at FIE 2024 with Isabella Joen, who's the R&D director at Aan and Robert.
We, Isabel.
Welcome.
Good morning.
So, what are some of the, ways that acacia gum can contribute to a healthier diet.
A gum is not only a food additive, it becomes more and more an ingredient used in many food matrixes, as used as a fiber to make fiber enrichment and to improve.
A global global profile of foods.
So in our lab we have tested the incorporation of fiber in many different products in order to help new kinds of formulation, trying to answer to new customer needs based on a diet containing more fiber, less sugar, less fat as.
And then we have noticed through very successful experiments that Acacia fiber can contribute positively to the formulation of this kind of new foods, new healthier foods, and then for instance acacia gum can.
Positively answer to many, many new needs like vegan, vegetarian diets.
Keto diets as , for instance, or even low food map diets as as we obtained the food map freely certification with our acacia fiber.
What about in terms of improving the nutri score our products, you know that when you want to decrease the nutrient score in order to have a better score, you have to decrease, for instance, the sugar content, fat content, or to increase the fiber content of your product, and then Acacia fiber can answer to this.
Target if you decrease sucrose in the compounds, you can replace partly or completely sucrose by a casa gum using sweeteners or other compounds in order to bring the taste, but with the casa fiber you will bring texture and you will improve the global aspect.
Taste and texture of the product, for instance, we have evidence that in biscuits you can decrease the sugar content of 30%, replacing the sugar with the cache fiber without any penalizing.
The global profile of the product, it is really interesting for that.
So you have a similar sensory profile.
Yes, absolutely.
We restore the global texture, the taste, and the global sensory of the product despite a significant reduction of sucrose.
Does that also involve adding a sweetener?
Without adding any sweetener in biscuits, for instance, yes, yes, absolutely.
