Hydrosol MD: Sustainability and shelf-life demands present opportunity

08 Dec 2017 --- Hydrosol (a Stern-Wywiol business unit), presented its new Stabifruit line at FiE 2017 in Frankfurt, an offer to the beverage industry, that is a completely new segment for the company. Hydrosol also presented new developments in ingredients for poultry, vegan meat substitutes, and dairy and whey products. With these functional systems, food manufacturers can easily make products that address current international consumer trends. 

In the growing worldwide market for soft drinks, fruit juices and fruit drinks are performing especially well. Hydrosol’s new Stabifruit line lets beverage manufacturers, as well as dairies, benefit from this growing demand. These all-in compounds contain all the important components for making fruit juice drinks and are claimed to offer many advantages over concentrates. They are easy to use and store, contain no preservatives and require only low dosages. Individual enrichment with vitamins and minerals is also possible. A portfolio of fruit flavors is available including orange, raspberry, banana and blackcurrant so that the new Stabifruit line of all-in compounds provides the basis for a wide range of fruit drinks whose mouthfeel, color, taste and viscosity leaves nothing to be desired. 

FoodIngredientsFirst caught up with Hydrosol’s Managing Director, Matthias Moser, at the show, who first discussed the new move into the beverage space. “The new Stabifruit line is a powder product which allows our customers in the processing industry to simply add water to create attractive fruit-based beverages,” he says. “We believe that our offer is especially attractive because we need to meet some of the major challenges which the industry producing fruit-based beverages faces today.”

In today’s market, there are several things that must be considered, with shelf-life and transportation conditions being key elements. For Moser, the Stabifruit line addresses these challenges. “Overall, the transportation in markets where the temperature conditions cannot be controlled efficiently might also lead to microbiological issues or lead time issues for the current solutions. And for all these three challenges, we are able to address them with our new solution,” he notes. 

Hydrosol is highly active in convenience food, meat applications and in dairy. Moser notes that the increasing share of industrially processed food, grow worldwide presents opportunities for this business to grow in parallel. “We see an equal spread over these three application fields’ good growth opportunities and action in all reaches of the world. For us at the moment, very interesting areas of activity are the Middle East, North Africa and Latin America,” he says. 

“Areas of strong growth are traditionally Eastern Europe and Russia, but we are also growing in Central Europe with our new premium solutions. An example of a nice growth story over the last 3-5 years is meat analogs and dairy analog products. These are areas where our solutions can really lead to attractive market products and add value for our customers.”

In the growing meat analogs category, Hydrosol presented new stabilizing and texturing systems for the manufacture of products like vegan nuggets, burgers, meatballs or “filet strips.” The end products deliver the accustomed bite and a similar texture to meat and can be pan-fried or deep-fat fried, without problems. They can also be used as ingredients for on-trend convenience solutions. 

“We also very recently launched our HydroTOP High Gel 30 product. This is a solution which allows to, in a way, glue together very different kinds of food matrixes. It allows you to shape burger patties or chicken nuggets by combining our High Gel 30 emulsion with pieces of meat, chunks of meat,” Moser notes. 

“But you could also use vegetables as an alternative,” he continues. “You can create vegetable only burgers and combine vegetables with meat products. In a way, this is a very attractive offer for the market of people who are interested in consuming less meat and we do see that trend continuing,” Moser confirms. “It was very strong in the last three years in Germany and these concepts are found more often in neighboring countries in Europe,” he says. Hydrosol is set to launch a product in the US market that includes their solution. “At the end of the day, it’s a matter of fact that the world’s population needs to consume more plant sources and more plant proteins. We cannot afford to eat meat in the future on the level that we do today,” he adds. 

Hydrosol and Stern-Wywiol 
Hydrosol is part of the food ingredients division of the Stern-Wywiol group. Hydrosol’s expertise in the area of stabilization and texturizing systems and the company’s performance during the last year contributed significantly to the growth of the Stern-Wywiol group overall, according to Moser (pictured, right with group CEO, Torsten Wywiol, left). “In this business year, the Stern-Wywiol group will, for the first time, exceed a turnover of €500 million, so that’s a real new dimension that has been reached in this business year,” he says, while remaining coy on Hydrosol’s specific contribution. 

“The expertise of Hydrosol is stabilization and texturizing. We consider this business area as one of the most important for the future of the food industry because, at the end of the day, there are two major challenges. One of these challenges is to provide sustainable food solutions, and one of the criteria which just define the shelf-life of food products is indeed the physical stability. So from that point of view – to extend the shelf-life of food products – stabilizing and texturizing solutions play a big role and this is a big contributor to sustainability,” Moser explains. 

Safety is central of course and also there, stabilizing and texturizing systems play a crucial role. “At the end of the day, the microbiology is also an important aspect there. Last but not least, food needs to taste good and be attractive to the consumer. Attractiveness actually goes beyond taste alone, so texture and mouthfeel is a very important attribute of a good food product. From these three perspectives, we see Hydrosol as fully in line with major trends and challenges in the food industry.”

Moser is confident about the current market outlook for ingredients suppliers. “Overall, the economy is recovering in Europe and the food ingredients industry is one of the key industries for the 21st century,” he explains. “It’s a global challenge to provide the growing world’s population with attractive food products. So in a way, the food ingredients industry is fully in line with one of the global megatrends. This is reflected in a growing interest in our products and the number of visitors at this year’s FiE.”

There is a rising demand for clean and clear label products, and Moser says it’s a challenge that the company is fully prepared to take on. “At the end of the day, you can work with whatever’s available in the domain of hydrocolloids regarding clean label solutions. You can combine that in a smart way with proteins. There are still a lot of possibilities to create functionality by smartly combining the right choice of ingredients,” he concludes. 

By Robin Wyers & Elizabeth Green