Taste solutions to enhance flavors
Since the mid-20th century, convenience foods, including ready meals, have multiplied globally, meeting the needs of modern consumer lifestyle by offering quick and easy meal solutions. In fact, convenience food revenues are estimated to increase at a CAGR of 6.5% from 2018 to 2029.¹ Initially sought for their convenience, consumer expectations have evolved significantly.
Today, there is a strong preference for healthier options characterized by clean labels and transparent packaging, all without compromising on taste. Consequently, food manufacturers are confronted with numerous challenges in formulating or reformulating their convenience foods. In this article, our experts discuss solutions for developing healthy, shelf-stable and clean label convenience foods with delicious flavor.
Summary
How to formulate delicious ready meals and convenience foods?
How to develop a healthier formulation for clean label convenience foods?
How to mimic meat taste in plant-based ready meals?
How to enhance spiciness in convenience food formulation?
How to offer a variety of tastes in ready meals?
Why choosing Biospringer’s ingredients in your convenience foods?
Challenges when formulating ready meals and convenience foods
“Convenience foods are among the most challenging food categories.” explains Ming Pei Yeo, Assistant Manager at Biospringer Asia Pacific Culinary Center. “Over the past few months, we have gathered our customers main challenges and developed taste solutions to support them. Additionally, we have created 7 recipes to showcase the potential of yeast extracts in convenience foods.”
How to formulate delicious low-salt ready meals?
Taste plays a crucial role in the decision-making process for consumers when choosing ready meals and convenience foods. According to Innova, in 2023, 61% of consumers prioritized convenience, while 41% highlighted taste as a key factor for consuming ready meals.²
To achieve a healthy, low-salt, clean-label, and tasty solution, food manufacturers can substitute MSG, salt and sweeteners with yeast extract. Unlike these additives, which are often perceived as unhealthy, yeast extract is a natural ingredient derived from fermentation.
Yeast extract’s main advantage lies in enriching food taste naturally through its rich umami properties. With this ingredient, salt can be reduced up to 30% in your food formulation.
Source: FMCG Gurus, Immunity Trends – Country report – 2024 (France, Malaysia, Brazil, South Africa, Argentina, Mexico, China, Italy, Australia)
How to develop healthier formulation for clean label convenience foods?
1 in 3 consumers globally reports always checking for ingredients of interest on their food products packing.³
Regulations worldwide are getting more and more strict. The use of additives and preservatives can significantly impact the final product labelling.
Employing a fermentation-based ingredient such as yeast extract provides an excellent solution for achieving clean label.
Yeast extract is certified vegan, Kosher, Halal and clean label. Depending on local regulations, yeast extract can be labeled as “yeast extract,” enabling manufacturers to improve taste without compromising on healthiness.
How to mimic meat taste in plant-based ready meals?
The global plant-based trend continues to thrive, with flexitarians comprising a substantial portion of consumers. These individuals seek familiar flavors in their plant-based foods, desiring tasty options with a satisfying mouthfeel.
46% of consumers globally express willingness to try plant-based versions of popular ready meals formats such as salad bowls, instant noodles/pasta/rice, soup/stew in place of meat or poultry.⁴
With over 150 years of expertise, Biospringer excels in replicating meaty notes such as dark, poultry, or roasted flavors thanks to yeast extract. Our Springer® Signature range can create chicken and beef meaty notes. It can also reproduce roasted, smoked or grilled notes, to mimic meat taste in your plant-based ready meal.
How to enhance spiciness in convenience food formulations?
Spiciness is especially favored in the Asia Pacific region.
Biospringer offers a range of products designed to enhance the spiciness of convenience foods, providing a spectrum of sensations from mild to high-intensity.
In June 2024, one of our Korean customer explained:
“With Springer® Reveal 1405, you deliver a stronger spice flavor impact with less spices. Additionally, you keep the actual spiciness lower than what Korean consumers can tolerate, making it an excellent option for export markets. This addresses the global interest in spicy food without exceeding local tolerances.”
Contact our experts for a demo session or to request samples.
How to offer a variety of tastes in ready meals?
Discovering new food concepts to attract customers can be challenging.
A recent trend involves the growing interest in regional tastes. Our local Culinary Center teams consistently develop inspirational recipes, spanning from authentic local food to innovative fusion dishes. We frequently share our new discoveries in our blog as well as on our LinkedIn page. Stay tunned!
Once you identified the taste you wish to achieve, contact our teams to discover the wide range of tastes yeast extract is able to perform. Indeed, due to its natural complex composition, yeast extract is a great tool to build complete taste profiles, by bringing out flavor notes.
Why choosing Biospringer’s ingredients in your convenience foods?
Biospringer’s fermentation-based ingredients are renowned as some of the best in the market, providing numerous benefits for food manufacturers pursuing healthy, clean label solutions. Yeast extract enhances taste across a wide range of applications, from soups to snacks and to meat processing.
Biospringer ensures reliable supply with local sourcing
With sustainability being a top concern, Biospringer ensures local sourcing by maintaining factories worldwide. This extensive network guarantees ingredient availability despite geopolitical tensions or natural disasters.
Contact us today to receive a sample within a few days! It enabled some of our customers to launch their new products within just 3 months!
Sources:
¹ Statista Market Insights, Convenience Food: Market data & analysis, 2024
² Innova Database, “Why do you typically consume ready meals?”, Asia, 2023
³ Innova Trends Survey 2024 (Global: Average of Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Mexico, Spain, UK, US), Innova Database
⁴ Innova Trends Survey 2024 (Global : Average of Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Mexico, Spain, UK, US)