FiE 2024: Taste solutions flourish to tackle worldwide ingredient shortages

Companies are adopting creative solutions to keep consumers enjoying the products they love in light of raw material shortages and price volatility in categories like citrus, cocoa and vanilla.

Food Ingredients First spoke with suppliers on the show floor of Food Ingredients Europe (FiE), which took place November 19-21 in Frankfurt, Germany, about their novel strategies to mitigate these issues.

Innova Market Insights’ sixth Top Ten Trend for 2025, “Sustainability — Climate Adaption,” highlights how brands are reimagining formulations to adjust to changing climates and disrupted supply chains.

Kerry likewise observed how supply chain instability was rapidly changing formulations, naming “Chain Reaction” as one of its Taste Trends for 2025.

“They say that ‘necessity is the mother of all invention,’ and that’s absolutely what we’re seeing now. The constraint of raw material is driving unexpected solutions that can lead to bold and surprising flavors that delight the consumer palette,” says Sheelagh Pentony, VP of marketing for Kerry Europe.

Reacting to the decline in citrus, Kerry is currently developing a solution for beverage manufacturers. “We’ve partnered with global experts in citrus processing that use highly efficient extraction technologies to help brands recreate the orange taste consumers love. We combine it with other citrus flavors and then build back sweetness and mouthfeel with our Tastesense technology. Putting all of that together can help customers address the citrus crisis,” she says.

Costly cocoa 

Cocoa replacement or reduction was a hot topic on the show floor, as multiple suppliers showcased their solutions to address high prices for cocoa ingredients.

Marie Le Beller, senior product manager at Prova, explains that inclement weather and swollen shoot disease have had a devastating impact on West Africa’s top cocoa-producing countries — Ghana and Ivory Coast.

“Planting new cocoa trees can’t keep up with the losses, since it takes five years for a new cocoa tree to produce pods,” says Le Beller, senior product manager at Prova.

“All these factors are leading to a decrease in global cocoa production while demand is slightly increasing. It’s no surprise prices are rising to historic highs. The industry has to find new solutions.”

Marie Le Beller, senior product manager at Prova.At FiE, Prova showcased flavors and extracts that can help brands reduce cocoa powder by about 30%. Le Beller shares that standard flavor solutions for cocoa reduction tend to boost all the flavor elements in the formulation, but Prova provides tailor-made offerings based on the application, type of cocoa powder and fattiness level.

“The goal is to bring back all the aromatic notes that are lost during a cocoa powder reduction without bringing in any other notes to the product,” explains Le Beller.

“Our flavorists analyze the product’s flavor profile with the full amount of cocoa powder versus a reduced base. We then rebalance to correct only for the specific notes that are missing, such as smokey, bitter or powdery.”

Cargill, meanwhile, presented its Indulgence Redefined concept, which demoed “future-proof” alternatives to chocolate and hazelnuts in “planet-focused treats.” Through its partnership with Silicon Valley start-up Voyage Foods, the cocoa giant crafted pralines at the trade show from specially roasted sunflower and grape seeds that boasted up to 95% lower water footprint and a 61% reduction in carbon footprint, with a close-to-true taste in cocoa and hazelnut.

New flavors in times of need

Other companies leveraged carob ingredients as near-cocoa contenders, such as the clean label company Prosur and Italian start-up Forever Land. The Mediterranean fruit is best known in the industry for its seeds used in locust bean gum. But its pod — once wasted — is proving to be a valuable side-stream ingredient in cocoa alternatives, albeit with some distinct flavor notes. 

Food Ingredients First spoke with Cargill on the show floor about its new chocolate alternative range. Aeshah Alzawi, business development specialist for Forever Land, is upfront that the company’s upcycled carob pod ingredient Choruba does not replicate the taste of chocolate. “We aren’t trying to replace chocolate. We love chocolate. But we want to reduce the consumption of it,” she says.

Le Beller, meanwhile, sees a creative opportunity where less cocoa is being used. At FiE, Prova featured twists on classic chocolate tastes with confections flavored as French chocolate or smoked chocolate.

Using alternative vanilla species further opens the door to innovation. The company crafted chocolates made using standard Vanilla planifolia from Madagascar and the less common Vanilla tahitensis from Papua New Guinea for comparison, which imparts anise and raspberry notes.

While vanillin is not a new ingredient, it has proven successful in boosting flavor when vanilla prices skyrocketed. It also provides consistent quality and stability, notes Maud Joassard, marketing manager at Syensqo, which is why many brands are not turning back, even as high prices subside. “The beauty of real vanilla lies in its variation, but this is a nightmare for formulators,” she says.

Syensqo demoed waffles and chocolate spread featuring its natural vanillin ingredient.Syensqo offers Rhovanil Natural, a natural vanillin made with ferulic acid from non-GMO rice bran oil that helps ensure a natural claim and security of supply. However, there are limitations to what can be claimed on the label so as not to mislead consumers, Joassard points out. “For example, in the US, a vanilla orchid cannot be pictured on-pack if the product does not contain real vanilla.”

Other alternatives grace the industry

Unstable prices and supply are by no means limited to the confectionery sector. Eggs and dairy have also faced tightened supplies.

Tackling the egg shortage, Netherlands-based Revyve featured a yeast-based egg replacer using “cutting-edge technology” to achieve authentic textures at FiE. Meanwhile, Beneo displayed an egg-free meringue made from faba bean concentrate. 

In the dairy space, Hydrosol introduced a hybrid vegetable fat and dairy whipped topping that can reduce costs. The highly stable topping uses the company’s Stabimuls ICR series to merge the two distinct ingredient matrixes into a single product. 

Finally, Bunge won the FiE Dairy Alternative Innovation award for its “Bunge Beleaf Plantery” ingredient designed to replace anhydrous milk fat (AMF) partly or fully based on shea, coconut and rapeseed oil, matching the melting behavior and structuring properties of AMF.