Cerestar looks to fish market

Cerestar Food & Pharma Specialties Europe’s Ascend (trehalose) can be used to great effect in surimi.

Cerestar Food & Pharma Specialties Europe is using one of its most innovative natural products to support growth in the European processed fish market.

The EU imports an estimated €9.55billion of processed seafood, every year used in products including surimi. Surimi - often used in imitation crabsticks and fish balls - is minced fish meat that has been leached by washing with water, and finally strained to get a concentrated fish paste. The fish paste is quickly frozen to ensure product freshness and texture.

Cerestar Food & Pharma Specialties Europe’s Ascend (trehalose) can be used in this process to great effect. To maintain the texture of the fish during freezing, various cryptoprotectants are used to help prevent ice crystals forming which can damage the cell walls and lead to a “soggy” product.

Up until now the industry standard for cryptoprotectants was a 4% sucrose and 5% sorbitol mix used in conjunction with phosphate. This can now be replaced by Ascend (trehalose) which has a unique ability to stabilise bio-molecules, cells and tissues during freezing, air drying, and freeze drying. This can be attributed to its higher effectiveness as a hydrogen bond donor, its higher glass transition temperature, and its higher ability as a water structure breaker when compared to other sugars.

Mark Wastijn, Marketing Director of Cerestar Food & Pharma Specialties Europe says: “We have the sole European license to distribute trehalose. This is a truly innovative product that gives improved protein functionality and stability when used during the freezing process to keep protein cell walls stable, so little humidity is lost.  This is especially important to manufacturers of frozen fish products such as surimi.”

Ascend (trehalose) also helps to maintain product freshness through improved gelstrength and elasticity to a greater extent, than the industrial standard after six months’ storage.

Trehalose is found naturally in hundreds of plants and animals and is consumed as part of a normal diet through foods including honey, mushrooms and shrimp.

Ascend has been developed in Japan by Hayashibara Co. Ltd and marketed in North and South America by Cargill Health & Food Technologies: the marketing for Europe has now been taken up by Cerestar Food & Pharma Specialties Europe. 

www.cerestarfoodandpharma.com