Company: Omya

Website: www.omya.com

Ingredient Snapshot: At this year’s FiE, Omya presented its range of high purity calcium carbonates bundled under the brand Omya Calcipur (Omya-Cal, in the U.S.) in addition to specialty ingredients from its distribution portfolio. Used in combination, these products enable complete solutions to come quickly to market and satisfy the latest consumer trends. Following the theme “The future stays natural”, the Omya experts demonstrated some of the multiple technical and health-enforcing benefits of their natural mineral particles by serving samples of calcium-enriched drinks and sugar-reduced cookies.

Omya Calcipur is a range of high purity natural calcium carbonate products suitable for calcium fortification as well as for technical enhancements. Thanks to its superior qualities, Calcipur can be used as a white pigment, a bulk provider, an extrusion aid and an anti-caking agent, as well as to improve all sorts of formulations – from savory to dairy, beverage and confectionery produce right up to supplements and nutraceuticals.

To bring these multiple benefits to life at FiE, Omya presented samples of cookies and plant-based drinks. 

To illustrate some of the technical advantages of Calcipur, the cookies were made with a reduced sugar icing that not only contained 35 percent fewer calories than regular icing, but thanks to Calcipur, also speeds up drying times of the coating. As well as replacing sugar, Calcipur is an ideal calorie-free bulking agent that provides whiteness, opacity and texture, all of which are of major importance for icings and coatings. Calcipur can also be used to substitute some of the flour in dough. Supporting the effects of baking powder, it facilitates the formation and homogenous distribution of fine gas bubbles, which influences the dough’s expansion and texture. Additionally, Calcipur helps to reduce the formation of acrylamide during the process of baking.

To ensure that manufacturers are able to react quickly to newly emerging consumer demands, Omya is also the holder of a distribution portfolio that includes a wide range of specialty ingredients and additives such as flavor enhancers, natural food colors, antioxidants, sweeteners, preservatives, acidity regulators, filling agents and vitamins. Together, Omya Calcipur and the ingredients from this distribution portfolio are a perfect match that enable the company to develop holistic solutions that fit all kinds of market trends, even including pet food applications.