Vegan Milk Chocolates Alternatives

Abstract

Vegan nutrition, lactose intolerance and abandonment of animal fats cause an increased demand for dairy-free products. At the same time a great variety of products with high pleasure value should be offered. In addition to consumer needs, environmental sustainability is getting more important. The production of dairy products including livestock husbandry releases high amounts of CO2 and is water consuming. For the further production of milk powder a high amount of energy is needed to reduce the water content from 90 % to 4 %. Thus, producing 1 kg milk or withe chocolate leads to release of around twice the amount of CO2 compared to dark chocolate. Producing dairy-free chocolate, which equals milk chocolate in texture and taste, would meet consumer requirements and is also a possibility to reduce CO2 emission and energy consumption. Some vegan milk chocolate alternatives are already available on the market. However most of them contain powders from vegan milk alternatives, in which water reduction is also needed. Other products contain nut pastes which are made from whole nuts and contain high amounts of fat. An increased fat content, compared to milk powder, leads to texture changes. Therefore the use of nut pastes is limited. However, the fat and water content of oilseed press cake is similar to whole milk powder. Press cake from oilseeds, which is a byproduct from oil production, is normally used as animal food. The use as an alternative for milk powder creates a higher value for the product. We replaced whole milk powder in a standard milk chocolate recipe by hazelnut, almond or peanut press cake. To ensure consumer acceptance sensory analysis was performed. Rheological properties were investigated and melting behavior was analyzed by DSC and NMR. The melting properties of the alternatives were similar to that of milk chocolate and consumer acceptability was between 60 to 80 % depending on the press cake type. Yield stress and viscosity were comparable to milk chocolate but varied with press cake type. A vegan milk chocolate alternative causing less impact on the environment and with high consumer acceptability was manufactured.

Full text

Isabell Rothkopf, Wolfgang Danzl
Fraunhofer Institute for Process Engineering and Packaging IVV, Giggenhauser Straße 35, 85354 Freising, Germany
Introduction
Milk chocolates are the most popular type of chocolates. The market
share of dark chocolates is only around 10-15%. On the other hand,
the food patterns of consumers is changing during the last years.
Intolerances against milk components such as proteins or lactose is
one topic, the pure relinquishment of animal products is another
topic for the request on products without milk. Yet the taste and
especially the melting behavior of milk chocolates is desired also in
pure vegan alternatives. Beside tending a consumer trend, vegan
products also possess the effect of being more sustainable by having
a smaller carbon and water footprint.
Common vegan replacers for milk powder
A closer look on the recipes of vegan chocolates available on the
market shows, that milk powders are replaced by products already
known as fresh milk replacers. These are the mainly water free
powders of rice milk, soy milk or lupine milk.
Milk fat is responsible for the soft texture and lower melting
temperatures of milk chocolates. To get the same effects in the
vegan alternative products, one has to use other vegetable fats which
dilute the crystal structure of cocoa butter or are incompatible to the
cocoa butter crystals. Common replacers are hazelnut, almond,
coconut or hemp oil.
Vegan Milk Chocolates Alternatives
Contact person:
Wolfgang Danzl
Phone: +49 (0) 81 61 / 491-607
Wolfgang.Danzl@ivv.fraunhofer.de
New challenges with vegan chocolate alternatives
New raw materials always give new challenges for the production and processes. Questions may arise on different process
steps of chocolate production:
•Grinding:
Do grinding parameters have to be changed to get a good particle size distribution? Does every vegan alternative plant
material behave like milk powder particles? Is roller milling still possible or does one need other grinding technologies?
•Conching:
What are good conching parameters (temperature, time, energy input, humidity) for vegan chocolate alternatives? Do
higher conching times and temperatures affect the oxidative stability of the products?
•Tempering, Crystallization and Cooling:
What are the right tempering and cooling parameters for these products? How good is the crystallization and the crystal
network? What is the solid fat content and melting stability of these products? Is the melting profile the same as for milk
chocolate?
•Stability:
How is oxidative stability affected by processes and raw material quality? How stable are these “chocolates” against fat
bloom?
•Other Questions:
How can a contamination between vegan and non-vegan products be avoided? What are further possible raw materials?
How can the product line be broadened to filled products? How stable are the chocolates against fat migration? Are there
other advantages of vegan products (healthier, less fat, less sugar)?
Fig. 2: Decreasing SFC of dark chocolate mixed with hazelnut oil
(HNO), butter fat (BF) or coconut oil (CNO)
Fig.1: Transaction of vegan and vegetarian food in Germany
between 2010 and 2015
14th Euro Fed Lipid Congress
Ghent, BELGIUM