Bakery shortening products win IFT Innovation Awards

Bunge North America collected an award for its Phytobake Shortening with Phytosterols while Caravan Ingredients won recognition for its Trancendim Emulsifiers for zero trans fat shortening.

Speaking exclusively to BakeryandSnacks.com, Peter Clark, chairman of the award judges said: “It’s a co-incidence that two bakery products won awards but the technical innovation of both was outstanding.”​

Functional shortening ​

Phytobake Shortening with Phystosterols from Bunge North America is a functional shortening for bakery applications. It allows the dilution of the amount of traditional hard fat or saturates and trans fats used in plastic shortenings by up to 46 per cent.

Using phytosterols to structure the shortening means that the finished product provides cardio protective benefits through lower cholesterol levels.

With zero grams of trans fat per serving the product is also said to improve the nutritional profile of food.

The shortenings are produced using enzymatic interestification which allows the re-arranging of the fatty acids to provide both structure and functionality at room temperature.

The process is also used to make margarines, baked goods, and confectionary with the texture, mouth feel, and smoothness similar to products made with saturated fats.

According to the judges’ citation: “Bakers using this ingredient can produce healthier sweet goods such as cookies, pie crust and cakes.”​

Meanwhile, Caravan Ingredient’s Trancendim emulsifiers offers a reduced fat alternative for structuring fats and oils in a way that matches or improves the melting behaviour of common fat-based products.

Saturated fat​

“The product line offers a variety of ways to make zero trans products with significant reductions in saturated fat,”​ claims the company. “This is achieved without a sacrifice in taste, mouth feel or flavour release.”​

Trancendim has a range of applications including cakes, cookies, donuts, Danish pastries, icing, puff pastries and laminated products.

In addition to bakery shortenings, Innovation Awards were also given to Buhler Barth and Log5 Corporation for their Controlled Condensation Pasteurization Technology and to Handary for its Nisin A Natural Antimicrobial agent.

Five awards were made from 56 entries which were limited to companies exhibiting at the IFT trade event.

The judges based their award decisions on the degree of innovation, technical advancement, benefits to food manufacturers and consumers and scientific merit, said Clark.