Elevating desserts through texture innovation

Consumers have always faced the challenge of balancing their longing for outstanding food with concerns for health and affordability. In current turbulent economic times, this is even more evident. That’s why one of our global megatrends is called “in control”, which reflects this striving for having our lives under control and finding the right balance between indulgence, health, convenience, affordability, and accessibility. According to FMCG Gurus, 55% of consumers are willing to try food and drink products they have not tried before. This serves as a new experience at an affordable price that offers a moment of small indulgence​ with flavor, texture, or format innovation.

For foods to stand out, taste of course plays a critical role. However, texture is an innovation frontier to tap into for innovative food. When it comes to texture, 1 in 2 consumers worldwide likes food products with unusual textures. One of the main reasons for this is because it helps food and beverage products to differentiate from the rest. (Source: FMCG Gurus). If we combine this with the need for affordable and healthy products, a new product trend emerges around aerated foods.

What is aeration?

Aeration of food means using air or gas in the food production process to make products lighter and reduce their density. Aeration can be incorporated into food in various ways, each leading to a distinct texture depending on gas content and bubble distribution (Source: GlobalData ForeSights: Aerated Foods). This plays an interesting role when we think about indulgent product categories like desserts or confectionery.

Why mousse texture?

Before we dive into different applications and use of aerated foods in sweet treats, let’s discover why mousse texture with aeration is interesting for desserts:

• Unique and luxury experience: One of the major advantages of aerated foods is the unique consumer experience often associated with luxury or culinary products.
• Multi-sensory pleasure: What brings this experience is a well-balanced combination of fluffy and light texture with a creamy mouthfeel, enhanced flavor perception and an outstanding visual appeal of mousse-type products. Aerated foods speak to all the senses.
• Reduced caloric density: According to consumer study results aerated food products lead to higher perceived satiety among consumers (Source: GlobalData ForeSights: Aerated Foods). With the seemingly bigger portion size but lower caloric density, aerated foods especially in the space of indulgent products, allows for better portion control and reduced calorie intake. It is thus a great option for health-conscious consumers looking for permissible indulgence treats.
• Value improvement: A product with aerated texture has a low weight-to-volume ratio and thus can lead to improved production and transportation costs, while still being perceived as premium by consumers.
• Versatility and customization: There are many different options of how to incorporate aerated texture into your product allowing for more flexibility and customization according to various target groups.

Overall, aerated foods hit the sweet spot of a unique eating experience paired with an affordable and light product.

The art of aerated desserts

For 42% of consumers globally, texture plays an important role in the purchasing decision for fresh dairy products (Source FMCG Gurus). Thus, for indulgent products like desserts of any kind, aerated mousse-like textures are emerging. This finds application in a wide range of products as below:

Fruity Way

Traditionally, the fruited foam layers in yogurts have been using gelatin as a foaming agent. As an alternative we have developed “Fruity Way” as a fruit foam with a high fruit content and using pea protein as a foaming agent. Fruity Way also finds its application in the confectionery industry where foam textures are widely used. It is a label-friendly solution with high fruit content and only plant-based ingredients making it a perfect aerated fruit filling for vegan confectionery products.

Ready for aerated desserts?

We’d be pleased to embark on the journey of mousse texture innovation in all forms of desserts or beverages with you. Our experts have developed various solutions balancing health, naturality, affordability and indulgence concerns of consumers in easy-to-use aerated mousses.