DES MOINES, IOWA — Food ingredient transparency is becoming more and more important to customers as sustainability and clean label are brought to the forefront of consumer demands. Food manufacturers must be aware of the background and usage of each ingredient added to their products, especially when it comes to shelf life.

“Consumer demands drive innovation within food manufacturers, which sometimes creates a divide or gap because consumers rarely understand the impact of removing or replacing certain ingredients on quality or shelf life,” said Courtney Schwartz, marketing director, Americas, Kemin Food Technologies.

That’s why Kemin Food Technologies has launched a new tool to their website: a virtual ingredient library. The tool will help bridge the gap between consumer demand and the ability to provide high-quality products.

“Consumers are continually demanding to know more about the ingredients in their food and where they come from,” Ms. Schwartz said. “The ingredient library will help give manufacturers an easy resource to reference when asked question about what the various ingredients used in their product are.”

Each ingredient card within the library is made to help customers identify ideal color, freshness and safety solutions for meat and poultry, baked goods, snacks, and fats and oils.

“We are excited to add a user-friendly ingredient library as a digital resource on our website,” Ms. Schwartz said. “This new tool offers the industry information on various Kemin ingredient solutions that are available to solve flavor, color and safety challenges in foods such as meat, poultry and bakery products.”

Kemin’s Customer Laboratory Services (CLS) team provides testing to customers to find solutions for ideal shelf-life and antimicrobial solutions. With knowledge in oxidation processes and food products at the molecular level, Kemin built their ingredient library to showcase Kemin ingredient solutions, including acerola, tocopherols, propionic acid, buffered vinegar, ascorbyl palmitate and others.

“Each ingredient has a dedicated page on our digital library with a summary of the ingredient’s history, sourcing, usage and areas of application,” Ms. Schwartz said. “Now, the industry can easily access our ingredient library and find out more about how our range of oxidation control and food safety solutions can help products stay fresher and safer for longer.”

Kemin’s new ingredient library can be accessed here.