On May 20, 2016, the US FDA announced the new Nutrition Facts label for packaged foods to reflect new scientific information, including the link between diet and chronic diseases such as obesity and heart disease. The new label will have a separate line showing how much sugar has been added to each food. The amount of “added sugar” will be expressed in grams and as a percentage of a “Daily Value”.

In response to this, Bell Flavors and Fragrances has announced the introduction of Sweetech technology as a smarter flavor enhancer alternative for the food and beverage industry.

Sweetech flavors provide numerous performance benefits to consumers and food manufacturers, and provide a compliment or alternative to nutritive and high intensity sweeteners. Sweetech comprises a range of flavors that deliver a full, rounded sweetness profile similar to sucrose.

Aaron Graham, Vice President of Technical Services at Bell Flavors & Fragrances said: “Our strategy is to provide value to customers by leveraging our passion for taste and innovation to create unique sweetness solutions that contribute to greater health and nutrition, while tasting great.”

Future plans are underway to continue to optimize the performance of Sweetech as new ingredients and technologies become available. Graham added: “We are truly excited about Sweetech because it really addresses a market need to manage sugar and sweetness; Sweetech can really help. We want people to know that Bell has the sweetness solutions to meet their needs.”

Health issues related to excessive sugar consumption are just one of the factors increasing the need for alternatives to traditional nutritive sweeteners such as sucrose and corn syrup. Ingredient labels, nutritional panels, and increasing consumer awareness are all spurring a need for new ingredients and methods for delivering sweetness to food and beverages.

Sensory testing has shown that Sweetech flavors can support reduction of sugar in foods and beverages by 20-50 percent, depending on the application, with no significant difference in taste. They can also improve the performance of high intensity sweeteners by helping to mask any bitter or undesirable taste. For product developers, Sweetech flavors are a great tool to simply boost sweetness in foods and beverages without sacrificing great taste.

Labeled as a flavor, Sweetech provides an attractive clean label consumer image. Available in liquid and powder form, with Natural or Artificial, Organic Compliant, Non-GMO Project, Trader Joes acceptable, TTB Natural, and USDA Natural options available to meet a wide variety of market needs. Sweetech flavors are effective in a wide variety of product applications and manufacturing processes, including bakery, confectionary, dairy, beverage, and savory products.