Healthy ancient grains cause extrusion challenges in snacks, says Bühler

Speaking to BakeryandSnacks.com at Snaxpo 2013 in Tampa Bay, Florida, area manager for extrusion North America at Bühler Mike Shaw said use of ancient grains and whole grains can impact taste, texture and mouth feel.

“It’s getting the right end-product characteristics that you want. So maybe there’s a bitter taste, or maybe it doesn’t have good expansion, so you have to play with the process parameters in the extruder to get not only the nutritional value but to also be able to get the end product attributes that a consumer will like – the taste, the crunch, the mouth feel.”​

“There are a lot of process parameters to control,”​ Shaw said.

He identified some other trends in extruded snack manufacturing like reducing fat, increasing protein content and simplifying processing and ingredients lists – all of which can have an impact on processing.

Shaw said Bühler’s innovation center that it opened in May 2012 provides a space for manufacturers to work on new product development (NPD) and conduct confidential laboratory and market testing.

The company has also lined up an extrusion workshop that it said should provide a broad spectrum of industry with the opportunity to learn about twin screw extrusion both theoretically and hands-on.