Sugar alternatives are the new fun of Food Tech
Here in America, we love sweet things. Whether it’s soda, candy, or ice cream, we eat more sugar than any other country.
It is not surprising that all this consumption of sugar can lead to health problems such as diabetes, which has created a large sugar substitute industry that offers a variety of artificial substitutes such as aspartame or sucralose and natural ones such as stevia and monk fruit.
But as it turns out, low or no-calorie alternatives sometimes come with their own health risks. For example, artificial sweeteners like sucralose and saccharin have been shown to raise blood sugar, damage your gut health and become toxic when exposed to high temperatures. And while many have embraced natural alternatives like stevia and monk fruit sweeteners over artificial sweeteners in recent years, recent research has shown that the sugar alcohol erythritol, which is often added to stevia and monk fruit as a sweetening ingredient, has been linked to heart attacks and strokes.
Despite these problems, consumers continue to consume sugar substitutes around the world. In fact, the sugar substitutes market is expected to grow from $18 billion in 2022 to more than $28.5 billion in 2032, fueled by increasing demand for a healthy lifestyle and growing interest in sugar alternatives in Asia.
This continued interest in sugar replacement could mean huge profits for those inventors who can create alternatives to that sweet taste without all the downsides of current offerings. This week The Spoon features two of these startups that are creating new sugar alternatives that represent a significant departure from those currently on the market.
First, there’s Oobli, which has found a way to make tea and chocolate sweet using a sweet protein called brazzein. Although brazzein is a sugary protein found in the West African oubli fruit, it is incredibly expensive and difficult to source. Oobli (which takes its name from the fruit) has found a way to make a chemically similar version of brazzein through microbial fermentation. They launched their chocolate line earlier this year and launched their flavored tea this week.
Another company we featured this week is Incredo, which does not replace sugar but increases its sweetness while reducing its impact on the body. The company does this by binding cane or beet sugar to a natural carrier, which then increases the sweetness as it hits the sweet taste receptors on the tongue. According to Incredo, their sugar reduction solution results in 30-50% less added sugar than food.
As I wrote earlier this week, I had the opportunity to try the delicious Oobli peach tea on stage at the SynBioBeta conference, and I think the company may have a hit on its hands. It tasted like sugary candy!
If you get a chance to try one of these new sugar recipes – or know of one we haven’t covered yet – drop us a line!
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Is Amazon Serious About International Delivery?
In 2017, Amazon was awarded a patent for something one might find in a science fiction novel: underground package delivery.
And although it seemed like they ripped a page out of a Hugh Howey novel, the argument for underground delivery tunnels – no carbon emissions, reduced traffic, etc. – makes sense.
But still, the idea still sounded strong, and in the next few years, there was no sign that the company was serious about this idea until last month when the founder of Amazon Jeff Bezos was seen testing the prototype of underground delivery in the home solution from Pipedream Labs.
Spoon readers may remember Pipedream Labs as a company with big plans to build an underground delivery network of pipes around cities to deliver food or other supplies right into homes. The company is working with Wendy’s and other restaurants in the near term — you’ve got to pay the bills, after all — but it still hopes to build a bigger vision for a city-wide underground delivery network.
In fact, in recent Twitter threadPipedream CTO Canon Reeves said the company is now dating well-organized community builders with a home delivery system.
Check out the full article on PipeDream Labs here.
Google Wants to End Single Use Plastic, So It’s Issued a Call for New Ideas
We all know that plastic is bad for the environment, but despite all the videos of plastic bottles and wrappers floating in the ocean and piling up in landfills, billions of single-use containers are used and thrown away every year.
Google decided to do something about it, so it launched a call for food companies with sustainable packaging to submit their products to the Google Single-Use Plastics Challenge. According to the company, Google will evaluate those products that meet the needs of the country and the country and succeed in integrating the standards of the Google Food program in the company’s US cafes and MicroKitchens. The finalists will have the opportunity to submit their products to Google and “the world’s best caterers” for evaluation at all of Google’s US offices.
By reading the fine print, Google prioritizes reusable serviceware and packages but will also accept the concepts of edible, fiber-based, or non-packaged serviceware/packages. The company will accept some post-consumer recycled packaging in certain categories, and while it will accept glass and aluminum, it makes it clear that this is “not preferred.” Those with plastic, bio-based, compostable, multi-layer, or PFAS lined products do not have to be active.
Although major companies have made progress in recent years in eliminating plastic in the form of straws and beverage containers, large amounts of plastic are still used in food service and restaurants every day. Google’s efforts go further by emphasizing food service plastic in all its forms, including plastic containers and wrappers, a major problem that has received less attention than plastic bottles, straws, and cutlery.
For those interested in applying to the Google Single-Use Plastic Challenge, you’ll need to hurry as the deadline is May 30.
Restaurant Tech
Wow Bao Launches ‘Hot Buns Club’, $99-a-Year Web3 Loyalty Program
Wow Bao, an Asian digital food startup that has expanded nationwide in recent years with a light-bulb restaurant model, announced the launch of its NFT program last week. The new NFTs, called Digital CollectaBaos, will be proof of membership in a new super fan group called the Hot Buns Club within the company’s Bao Bucks loyalty program.
Wow Bao envisioned a web3 last November that would eventually encompass concepts as far-fetched as metaverse vending machines, but before they take their hot buns to the physical realm, they’ll start onboarding dedicated customers with its powerful NFT subscription plan for $99 a year.
Initial benefits for Wow Bao NFT owners include 10% discount on delivery orders, double Bao Bucks points on purchases, 10% discount on retail orders, and contest giveaways.
The Wow Bao NFT system is built on the Polygon network, a Proof of Stake consensus algorithm blockchain that proponents say is more environmentally friendly than many other Ethereum-based digital currencies. Despite the support of the blockchain of its new supertier of trust, Wow Bao – at least for now – underestimates the crypto angle given all the negative reports the technology has received in the past year, positioning it as a digital collection with corresponding benefits for members.
To access the full story, go to Spoon.
Winners of NASA’s Deep Space Food Challenge Combine Astronaut Oven & Air Protein Technology
Last week, NASA announced the winners of the final phase of the Deep Space Food Challenge, a competition designed to help explore and better understand how these organizations can feed people in space. The US Space Agency has awarded $750,000 in prizes in the second phase of the Deep Space Food Challenge, and the winning teams will compete in the final phase of the challenge along with $1.5 million in cash.
The start of the third phase is the culmination of almost two years of competition where hundreds of applicants competed for 28 in the first round of the eleven who won in phase 2, and as of last week, eight companies competing in phase 3.
The following five US teams are among the eight finalists in Division 3:
- Airline Company of Brooklyn, New York, developed systems and processes to convert air, water, electricity, and yeast into food.
- Interstellar Lab of Merritt Island, Florida, is building a modular biogenerative system to produce fresh microgreens, vegetables, mushrooms, and insects.
- Kernel Deltech USA of Cape Canaveral, Florida, is developing a system to grow ingredients made from mushrooms.
- Nolux of Riverside, California, is developing a solution that mimics the photosynthesis that occurs in nature to produce plant- and mushroom-based ingredients.
- SATED (A safe, clean, effective, and delicious resource) of Boulder, Colorado, developed a space cooker that would allow astronauts to prepare a variety of meals with long-lived ingredients.
Read the full story here at Spoon.
