Novel meat cultures set new standard for good taste

Chr. Hansen has just launched two novel starter cultures with an improved ability to deliver flavor in dry and semi-dry fermented sausages. The two cultures have been named BactoFlavor BFL-F02 and BFL-F05.

”Consumers want food products to be healthy, safe and produced in a sustainable way, but more than anything they want them to taste good,” says Eva Stenby, Marketing Manager, Meat Cultures, Chr. Hansen.

The two new cultures BactoFlavor BFL-F02 and BFL-F05 stand to prove that the global supplier of ingredients, Chr. Hansen, not only knows this, but also acts upon it.

“With many years of experience in the area of meat cultures we have a vast knowledge about how different bacteria act in different applications,” explains Eva Stenby. She adds: “We also know how to use this knowledge to identify new strains which can, even under the harshest conditions, provide the optimum flavor development and at the same time deliver a fast and reliable fermentation.”

The customers’ choice

“We simply took 12,000 strains and narrowed them down to two so far unknown strains - with a new and improved ability to deliver flavor,” explains Stenby.

The first sorting from 12,000 strains to nine was made by a chemical analysis. The second by Chr. Hansen’s own sensory experts and 11 customers throughout Europe.
As a result two flavors at separate ends of the flavor range were selected: one mild and creamy, the other strong and intensive.

The BFL-F02 and BFL-F05 are primarily aimed at customers in Europe. And since taste buds differ from region to region, more trials will be carried out in the near future.

“Customer taste panels in South and North America will assist us in selecting the best BactoFlavor strains for these regions,” Stenby concludes.