New stevia cocoa and vanilla flavor enhancers

PureCircle is launching stevia leaf-based flavor enhancers that augment vanilla and cocoa flavors.

The new products can be labelled as natural flavors on product ingredient labels; they enhance the mouthfeel, sweetness quality and different tonalities across a wide range of applications.   

Consumer demand for natural cocoa and vanilla ingredients has remained upbeat.  As evidenced by global new product launches from Mintel*, new products containing cocoa have grown +16% over the past 5 years, and vanilla has increased +31% over the same time period (2011 to 2016).

Furthermore, the new flavor enhancers can bolster companies' supply of limited cocoa and vanilla ingredients, and thereby diversify risk strategies by introducing a plant-based solution. They will allow developers to reduce the amounts of cocoa and vanilla alongside sugar without compromising taste.

Commodity markets for cocoa and vanilla can be highly volatile. In 2016, cocoa prices fluctuated between $2,000 and $3,000 per metric ton. Following much publicized flooding and other issues, experts have estimated that vanilla will exceed $500/kg.

The new stevia leaf discoveries enable PureCircle to engage with customers active in the $12bn cocoa market and $1bn vanilla market (based on current prices).

Along with these flavor enhancer discoveries, PureCircle's innovative stevia sweeteners continue to see heavy adoption as they enable low-calorie and zero-calorie formulations of food and beverages. PureCircle is continuing its leadership role in the research, development and innovation to produce a growing supply of multiple varieties of stevia sweeteners.

Faith Son, Head of Marketing and Innovation comments: "We are excited to have an opportunity to meet new needs of our customers by introducing these flavor enhancers that specifically address cocoa and vanilla. We strive to uncover new properties within the stevia leaf, and this breakthrough enables us to service new markets and customers in a meaningful way.  PureCircle is committed to maximizing the full potential extracted from each leaf, and we believe our ability to reduce sugar and enhance key flavor tonalities naturally will be a winning combination."

* Data provided by Mintel GNPD 2011-2017