PLANT BASED DAIRY ALTERNATIVES 2022
SACCO SYSTEM
Plant-based alternatives that
intend to resemble cheese
A survey based on European
consumer attitudes towards
plant-based foods, showed
that 28% of European consumers
would most likely purchase plantbased
cheese on a regular basis if
taste and texture were identical to
conventional cheese.
Consumers in Spain, Germany, Austria,
Romania, and Italy are most
likely to replace conventional cheese
products with plant-based cheese
products.
In terms of plant-based cheese,
German consumers would especially
like to see plant-based cream
cheese (32 %), sliced cheese (32 %),
and plant-based mozzarella (31 %)
available in supermarkets.1
In Germany plant-based hard sliced
cheese showed the highest value/
volume sales (+64 %), followed by
plant-based cream cheese sales
value (+75 %). Plant-based mozzarella
is more significant for discounters
than for the overall market.2
Plant-based alternatives that intend
to resemble cheese are complex
colloidal dispersions consisting
of lipid droplets, embedded within a
viscoelastic polysaccharide and/or
plant proteins network.
Plant-based cultured alternatives
that intend to resemble cheese, are
obtained from a range of different
ingredients, such as soybeans (fermented
tofu), soy, lupin, pea, chickpea
and fava bean protein concentrates
or different types of nuts (i.e.,
cashews, almonds) obtained after
soaking, mincing and filtered water
addition. The mass undergoes
a natural fermentation and then is
added with other ingredients like
vegetable oil (coconut, palm, canola,
sunflower), modified starches
(potato, corn, tapioca), thickeners
(carrageenan, guar gum) and Salt
among many others (depending on
the recipes).
Plant proteins used in plant-based
cultured alternatives that intend
to resemble cheese need to fulfil
different functional attributes such
as emulsifying, and gelation properties.
3
Starches are used in plant-based
cultured alternatives that intend to
resemble cheese because of their
ability to form a viscous paste or gel
upon heating (gelatinization) and
cooling (retrogradation/setback),
which entraps fluids and other
ingredients within the 3D-poly-
saccharide network formed.4
Sunflower, corn, and canola oils
contain substantial amounts of unsaturated
fatty acids, so tend to
be liquid at ambient temperature
and cannot form fat crystal networks.
Coconut and palm oils form
fat crystal networks at room temperature
36 · September/October 2022 ¦ international-dairy.com
and generate desirable
textural attributes in plant-based
cultured alternatives that intend to
resemble cheese.
Common manufacturing process
employed to promote the sol-gel
transition are heat treatment, acidification,
and enzymatic crosslinking.
The enzyme crosslinking approach
coupled with acidification has been
utilized to produce pea-based
cheese analogs.5
Fermentation is a technique that
has been used for centuries to improve
the shelf-life of food, but also
for food processing, hence changing
the structure and functionality, as
well as the flavors.
Improvement can be achieved in
plant-based alternatives that intend
to resemble cheese through
microbial fermentation, since lactic
acid fermentation has the advantage
of having a positive impact
/international-dairy.com
