Company: ADM/Matsutani

Website: www.fibersol.com

Ingredient Snapshot: As food and beverage formulators work to meet both the pending regulatory changes regarding added sugars and consumers’ nutritional demands, Fibersol soluble dietary fiber ingredients offer a solution to help formulators ‘redo’ sugar in their products.

In addition to maintaining the same level of sweetness, there can be a virtual laundry list of challenges created when reducing added sugar, including: perception of moistness or tenderness, reduced shelf life, lack of color development, and a variety of other formulation issues that consequently compromise the ability to meet consumers’ expectations for taste and texture.

Fibersol soluble vegetable fiber (corn) is a vital part of three sugar reduction strategies:

• Reducing sugar and replacing with Fibersol without detectable loss in sweetness or other quality characteristics. This strategy is most suited for high sugar, high solids systems such as confections and icings and high sugar snacks such as certain cookies.
• Rebalancing and repositioning the entire formula to make a better-for-you food. Formulators can use Fibersol to displace “added sugars” (which may result in a fiber nutrient claim) and add other ingredients such as proteins and whole grains to pump up beneficial dietary components.
• Replacing sugars to make a “sugar-free” claim by formulating with sugar-free sweeteners. For example, a low level of Fibersol in “sugar-free” beverages avoids the ‘watered down’ taste and mouthfeel that can happen with other sugar-free solutions.

Each gram of Fibersol-2 is 90 percent fiber and provides only 0.02 grams of sugar, 1.6 Kcal, and can replace many of the non-sweetening functional properties of sugar, offering an option to replace sugar and achieve the caloric reduction that many consumers expect. Easy-to-use Fibersol can be dropped into most applications with minimal formulation adjustments. It is completely soluble, adds minimal viscosity and has no added flavor, taste or color. It is also heat, acid, shear and freeze/thaw stable. Fibersol maintains its fiber content under these conditions and in processes that require culturing or fermentation. Additionally, Fibersol is easy to use, because Fibersol adds fiber without absorbing water or imparting a gritty texture.