Dr Craig Sherwin, technical service manager at Novozymes, said, “Dairies are under increased pressure to find innovative ways of reducing the sugar in their products. Of course, that’s a task easier said than done. That’s why we created a new online calculator to estimate the potential to reduce added sugar in dairy products when using lactase.”
With diseases like obesity and type 2 diabetes on the rise, healthier eating is a topic on the minds of consumers and public health authorities the world over. People want reduced calories in their dairy products, but they’re not eager to compromise on the tastes and texture.
Novozymes created Saphera, an enzyme solution that boosts sweetness and allows dairies to use less sugar in their formulations, as well as production of a wide range of lactose-free products, including milk and fermented dairy products such as yogurt.
Less sugar - but still sweet
For dairy producers, taking sweetness into account is especially important when reformulating products. Lactose, for instance, is not particularly sweet on its own. But, when broken down with the lactase Saphera into glucose and galactose, the resulting sugars become almost 50% sweeter. That means dairies can achieve the sweetness that consumers love – with less added sugar or sweetener.
“We know it can be a big step for dairies to change their formulations to use less sugar while keeping the same sweetness. But, with the right tools, it’s possible to meet this consumer demand. Using lactase as a foundation to a toolkit approach for reduced added sugar can strike the right balance,” Sherwin said.
“The calculator is a model, a first step for developers at dairies to predict how much sugar could be reduced and accelerate their benchtop work.”
The calculator asks users to input the known lactose content of the ingredients used in a yogurt or flavored milk formula and the sucrose content of their benchmark formula with ideal sweetness. The tool then reveals how much less sucrose you could use if Saphera is used to boost the sweetness instead. The calculator, which is available here, is free of charge and can be accessed in any web browser.