Page 12 - Baking Europe Journal - Winter 2022

INGREDIENTS
12 SUGAR REPLACEMENT

content of the product but without
employing a replacement, by adding
artifi cial sweeteners or by reducing
sugar and adding a bulk replacement
ingredient with or without artifi cial
sweetener.

It must be noted that reducing the
sugar content without using a suitable
replacement will alter the taste and
texture profi le of the product. Unlike
salt, even a relatively small reduction
in sweetness may be noticed by
consumers, especially as sucrose has
the ability to mask bitter fl avours
(Beck et al., 2014). Such
modifi cations can of course, be
communicated to customers through
marketing activities but this runs the
risk of emphasising recipe changes
and possibly losing customer
appreciation if they had not perceived
the changes themselves (Markey,
Lovegrove and Methven, 2015;
Tedstone et al., 2015).

In these circumstances, therefore,
reformulation can have a profound
eff ect on sales, which may fall if the
perceived quality is lessened or prices
increase.

“Always accentuate the positives” is
the maxim any successful marketing
or sales professional will tell you, by
perhaps, highlighting the
initiative that will be led by the United functions that are carried out by reformulation as “healthier” for
Kingdom and it is likely that their sucrose such as sweetness, texture, instance, “lower in sugar” or “low in
government’s guidelines will form the mouthfeel, Maillard browning, heat calories”, any of which may increase
basis of the those produced by the stability, bulking behaviour, neutral product sales. (Devaux and Vuik, 2019).
network (WHO, 2022). aftertaste and rapid onset of
sweetness. In practice, the reduction Reformulation options: Reduce
Sugar replacements of sugar content in a recipe is sugar and add a high-intensity
Sugar replacement ingredients are achieved by any one of three sweetener
used principally to substitute the methods; by reducing the sugar Whilst the diffi culties of reducing

“Reformulation can have a profound eff ect on

sales, which may fall if the perceived quality is

lessened or prices increase.”

BAKINGEUROPE Winter 2022/2023
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