Most food companies strive to launch products with wide appeal, but varied consumer demographics, tastes and interpretations make it impossible to please everyone. Add to the mix diverse nutritional and marketing goals, and you glimpse the formulation difficulties bar developers face. Vitamins and minerals, as well as fiber, are popular standards that appeal to wide swaths of the population, and other ingredients that promise benefits for specific segments—such as weight loss and gut health—are finding a solid fan base.
Customization options
“Each product is unique and requires the development of a custom nutrient formulation that supports the label claims a manufacturer wishes to make,” says Ram Chaudhari, Ph.D., FACN, CNS, senior executive vice president, chief scientific officer, Fortitech, Schenectady, NY. He recommends partnering with an experienced nutritional premix formulator at the start of the development process to minimize the challenges associated with not just bringing products to market, but ensuring the product lives up to its label claims and delivers repeat purchase.
“Fortification must meet two major hurdles,” notes Rodger Jonas, national business development manager, P.L. Thomas & Co., Inc., Morristown, NJ. “The ingredient must survive processing and distribution, and the ingredient must not just work, but survive governmental scrutiny for effectiveness.”
Bar formulations that incorporate multiple nutrients have many challenges. According to Chaudhari, these include “the desired taste, flavor and color of the finished product; solubility; bioavailability; pH level; safety/toxicity; interactions among various ingredients; and bioavailability and stability of the individual ingredients. Factors that can affect stability, for instance, include temperature, pH, oxygen, light and moisture, to name a few.”
An example of a potential interaction is a bar that combines thiamine and a dried or puréed fruit treated with sulfur dioxide. “This combination can possibly result in immediate degradation of thiamine due to the fruit’s carry-over of sulfur dioxide. The level of sulfur dioxide should be determined prior to fortification and appropriate overages should be added to compensate for losses,” says Chaudhari.
The core challenge is the complexity of the food matrix. “Many of these ingredients are multifunctional, so removing or adding new functional-food ingredients may disrupt the total balance of the product,” Chaudhari explains. “Adding in-demand nutrients together may affect taste, appearance, texture or all three.”
Undesirable interactions between the various components of complex foods increase the risk of quality deterioration in a product. “Of particular concern is moisture transfer between components with different water activity,” says Chaudhari. “Other interactions that can affect the sensory quality of a product include the migration of coloring, fats, oxygen and other flavoring substances; plus, the migration of vitamins and minerals is also a concern. These changes present further challenge to taste and limit a product’s shelf life.”
Encapsulated ingredients limit migration and prevent premature release of ingredients that can negatively affect flavor and limit shelf life. “Processing methods may also play a role in delivering flavor characteristics to please consumers,” Chaudhari continues.
Despite these challenges, bars can be one of the easier products to fortify. They typically won’t have an acidic pH and solubility isn’t an issue. Most “classic-style” soft and chewy bars only go through a mixing, forming and drying procedure and are not subjected to the high temperatures required for baked products. Therefore, nutrients degraded by heat can be added prior to processing with minimal loss. Adding nutrients to coatings applied after drying or baking is another option that helps deliver the targeted level, plus it can form a barrier that protects susceptible nutrients from oxidative degradation. Packaging is typically an opaque film that protects vitamins sensitive to light in the visible and near-ultraviolet range, such as riboflavin (vitamin B2) and pyridoxine (vitamin B6).
Many grains, especially whole grains, are naturally high in phytic acid, which is an antioxidant. This compound acts by chelating minerals, including zinc, magnesium and calcium, and may impair the absorption of these minerals. However, some research indicates the grains promote intestinal fermentation by probiotics, enhancing absorption over time.