Baking&Snack - November 2011 - 41

HONEY

Bakers can satisfy consumer d demands f clean-labell products using h d for l l b d i honey as a sweetener and functional ingredient.

BY REBECA LÓPEZ-GARCÍA ees travel a long way to bring nature’s contribution to modern products. In fact, bees travel at about 15 miles per hour to gather nectar, and a hive must fly more than 50,000 miles to collect enough for a pound of honey. That’s a lot of ground to cover to satisfy consumers’ demand for natural sweetness. “Honey is the ideal sweetener because it not only imparts exceptional flavors in all bakery foods, but it also sweetens baked products naturally and gives bakers a ‘clean label’ alternative to other sweeteners,” said Emily Manelius, communication specialist, National Honey Board. James Mitchell, innovations and development manager, Ciranda, Inc., Hudson, WI, added that honey is natural and comes in an organic form, both of which are desirable attributes for many products. Because of honey’s high sweetness level, he said, products made with honey rather than sugar can include less sugars, thus achieving slight calorie reductions. FUNCTION JUNCTION. Honey has many functional benefits in bakery foods, Ms. Manelius said. It helps extend the shelf life of products with a natural ingredient. Honey’s fructose

content holds in a bakery food’s moisture, and it has high acidity (average pH 3.91), which inhibits mold growth. According to research published in 2004 by M.A. Mundo, O.I. Padilla-Zakour and R.W. Worobo in the International Journal of Food Microbiology, honey has the capacity to serve as a natural food preservative because of the generation of hydrogen peroxide, which acts as an antibacterial agent. Other researchers identified compounds such as flavonoids, particularly caffeic and ferulic acids, as the most likely contributors to the antimicrobial activity. In addition, honey can be used to add flavor and aroma to different products. According to the National Honey Board, there are more than 300 kinds of honey in the US, originating from such diverse floral sources as clover, eucalyptus and orange blossom. This simple, yet complex, variety of flavors allows food manufacturers to launch complete product lines of honeysweetened foods, all with different flavor profiles. For example, a product with buckwheat honey offers a robust flavor, while a clover or alfalfa honey provides a simpler, lighter honey taste. This is mainly because darker honeys

generally contain higher amounts of minerals than lighter honeys, said Joe Hickenbottom, vice-president, sales and marketing, Malt Products, Corp., Saddle Brook, NJ. In general, lighter-colored honeys are mild in flavor, while darker honeys have a ▼ Beyond natural sweetening, honey can help baked goods retain moisture and resist mold.
NATIONAL HONEY BOARD

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November 2011 / BAKING & SNACK

Baking&Snack - November 2011

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