How does the future of protein-rich microalgae foods look like? Organised by ProFuture partner Bridge2Food, the webinar of 22 March 2022 had a look at this question, showcasing a variety of microalgae products & the latest formulations partners are creating, testing and validating with consumers.

Watch the recording of the interesting discussions here or get an overview of the three presentations below.

Josep Comaposada, researcher at IRTA: The future of microalgae & foods: Plentitude project and the development of creams and energy bars

Josep started his presentation by explaining the aim of the ProFuture project: With a growing world population, we will need 52% more protein in 2050 – microalgae have the potential to help meet this challenge.

He then gave an introduction of the multi actor approach of ProFuture, taking into account the entire microalgae value chain, and explained how IRTA is working on the reformulation of food products. He focused on the creation of new versions of vegetables creams and energetic bars, aiming to improve the nutritional value of the products, such as protein content and antioxidant value, while taking into account food attributes such as color, odor, taste, texture and functional properties. Once the most successful variation of the product is determined, they will be validated with consumer studies to ensure their success on the market. The next step will be to develop energetic drinks with microalgae.

Israel Hernandez Lopez, researcher at IRTA: Food and feed reformulation – Bakery Products

Israel focused his presentation on bakery products enriched with microalgae, such as spirulina bread, grissini, crackers and muffins. At IRTA they compared nutrient content and sensory analysis of different versions of the food formulations. Taking into account a variety of tests, the overall conclusions were that Grissini with 2,5% Chlorella, Muffins with 2,5% Chlorella or 1,5 Spirulina and crackers with 1,5% Chlorella or 1,5 % Spirulina were most successful.

The next steps will be to test the products under real industrial conditions. In addition, IRTA will work on brioche enriched with microalgae, the analysis of shelf-life, gluten-free product trials as well as aroma additions to selected formulations.

Marie-Christin Baune, Postdoctoral Researcher at German Institute of Food Technologies (DIL e.V.): Application of microalgae (Chlorella vulgaris) in pasta

Marie-Christin explained that pasta is a very promising candidate to test with microalgae as an added ingredient for several reasons: microalgae does not only improve the nutritional value of pasta but also has good chances of being accepted by consumers as they are already familiar with the green pasta; in addition, the storability of dry pasta is good as it can be kept for at least two years.

At DIL e.V. they first checked the ingredients (Chlorella vulgaris and semolina) in terms of macronutrients, micronutrients and vitamins. An advantage of Chlorella is for example the high content in B vitamins:

They also tested the pasta in terms of physical properties, colour, cooking-loss and cut-resistance, nutritional changes and did scanning-electron microscopy and could see very promising results overall.