IFT First 2024: Agrana unveils bakery-inspired ice cream flavors and vegan street-food innovations

18 Jul 2024 --- Agrana, a global food and industrial goods supplier, launched new products from its fruit preparations and starch portfolio during IFT First in Chicago, US. These include novel ice cream creations with flavors like Vietnamese coffee as an affogato, Summer in Paris, an ice cream with light notes of cheese served in macaron shells with berry jelly and London Fog, an Earl Grey tea ice cream concept finished with a lavender swirl. 

Food Ingredients First talks to Ginamarie Musumeci, associate marketing manager, Agrana Fruit US, to understand the idea behind the concept and current ice cream trends, such as the snackification of ice cream and the rise of bakery flavors.

“The overarching theme highlights handhelds like sandwiches and small bites of ice cream. It’s ‘permissible indulgence,’ which might be an old term, but the idea is to have different occasions to eat ice creams with people working from home and looking for a small bite of something tasty or indulgent during lunch.”

Musumeci notes that people are looking for smaller, decadent bites to start their mornings, and brands have quickly adapted.

“Marrying the idea of indulgence and bakery flavors and ice cream right now are very big with the Paris Olympics. We also have a picnic-inspired ice cream concept with brie cheese and mixed berries sandwiched between macaron cookies.”

Another key Paris-inspired offering from the company’s portfolio is honey butter ice cream between profiteroles “almost reminiscent of a croissant.”

Marrying coffee with indulgence
The company’s second theme for its ice creams at the show finds inspiration in a modern coffee house.

“This theme marries the booming coffee with indulgence and ice cream. We have four flavors, such as Vietnamese coffee, which isn’t just the iced coffee that everyone orders at a coffee house. We tried to elevate those flavors with ice cream and condensed milk with chocolate splits.”

Musumeci notes that people are looking for smaller, decadent bites to start their mornings, and brands have quickly adapted (Image credit: Steven Metzer).The COVID-19 pandemic has changed the idea of coffee culture, notes Musumeci, making at-home coffee indulgence more prominent.

“The modern coffee shop was a place to hang out; it wasn’t just about grabbing coffee. Then COVID hit, and coffee culture at home became quite popular. It’s now spilling into packaged flavors and consumer packaged goods flavors, as well as bringing new life to coffee in a way beyond just making it at home.”

“So we are jumping on the train of consumer interests at home to bring new coffee-flavored products to the market.”

Snackification in ice cream
Snackification, the trend of eating smaller meals throughout the day, is a key driver in the confectionery sector. Musumeci traces the snackification of ice cream to the boom of the mochi, a sweet Japanese cake with fillings.

“Mochi was the first small bite on the market in the ice cream space. And it is still quite popular, but I think grabbing a piece instead of a spoonful is quite novel in ice cream since there are not many products you can grab and go.”

While the category is still expanding, consumers interested in portion control or those staying home often are increasingly looking for “anything smaller than a pint of ice cream.”

Vegan market trends
In addition to ice cream, Agrana also aims to tap into the vegan market with its subsidiary Marroquin Organic International, which offers a range of organic starches. Many of the Austrian supplier’s starch products, such as potato fibers, corn starches and wheat proteins, are used in vegan meat substitute products, beverages, animal feed and pharmaceutical products.

Klaus Zaglmayr, director of sales at Marroquin, tells Food Ingredients First about the consumer trends behind the company’s food-truck menu at IFT, which features vegan, organic street-food style dishes such as gyros, Korean BBQ stir fry and gluten-free bread.

“We wanted to show that plant-based proteins and meat alternatives can be delicious. The two products we featured from Agrana starch are potato fiber to retain moisture and provide juiciness to the product and the Vital Wheat Gluten as the protein source.”

The two ingredients are part of Marroquin Organic's extensive portfolio in the US, featuring starches, sweeteners, fiber, yeast, glycerin and plant-based proteins.

Klaus Zaglmayr notes that Marroquin is onboarding two new ingredients into its portfolio to meet the demand for protein.Zaglmayr notes that the larger meat analog market has “slowed down” slightly due to inflation. While consumption may have dipped with consumers feeling the pinch and essential commodities getting expensive, he sees growth for products like Agrana’s wheat gluten in the US market.

“More and more people are embracing a lifestyle that reduces meat consumption, where they may not remove meat from their diet completely, but eat it once a week. Therefore, consumers are looking for tasty alternatives that are sustainable and good for the environment.”

Plant-based analogs such as nuggets, bites and burgers are popular among consumers because they are convenient.

However, Zaglmayr says that while the market’s appetite for fast food-inspired plant-based products isn’t going away, Agrana offers “many good-looking and tasty products to make nutritious lunches” that are not “limiting.”

Plant-based challenges
Cost, cost, clean label ingredients and nutrition parity of meat analogs remain challenges for the industry.

“There was a trend to mimic all the qualities of a, let’s say, a hamburger with a plant-based analog. There’ll be a challenge to provide a product that provides as many nutrients as a beef burger; for instance, that’s why it can be just a part of a healthy diet. Protein is important, and using plant-based alternatives means you’re halfway to a healthy diet,” explains Zaglmayr.

The company is onboarding two ingredients into its portfolio to meet the demand for protein: fava bean protein concentrate and brown pea protein for more “sustainable and natural” products.

By Anvisha Manral, with live reporting from Missy Green at IFT First 2024