formulation

The Scaling Wall: Why Great Small-Batch Products Fail in Commercial Manufacturing

April 6, 2026 by Kristen Nicoletti

Every CPG founder has the same milestone in mind. The day your kitchen-tested product moves from a five-quart mixer to a commercial production line. You have dialed in the flavor. The branding feels cohesive. Retail buyers are interested. Purchase orders arrive.

Then the first pallet shows up from the co-packer.

And something is off.

The texture is gummy. The color looks dull. The shelf life data does not match your pilot batch. The product you perfected in small scale no longer behaves the same way at production scale.

This moment is so common in food and beverage manufacturing that it has a name in our world. We call it hitting the scaling wall.

Scaling is not simply making more. It is translating a formula into a completely different physical environment. Once you move into industrial tanks, continuous flow systems, automated fillers, and high-speed packaging, the physics governing your product change. The underlying chemistry does not care that your recipe “worked before.”

Below are five of the most common and costly failure points we see when products move from bench scale to commercial production.

The Shear Force Phenomenon

In a home kitchen, you stir. In a plant, you shear.

Industrial pumps, high-speed mixers, inline homogenizers, and long transfer lines expose product to intense mechanical forces. This is hydrodynamic shear, and it can fundamentally alter the structure of your formulation.

What goes wrong

Proteins can denature under excessive shear. Emulsions can destabilize. Hydrocolloid networks can weaken. Particle size distribution shifts. What was once a stable emulsion in a bowl can fracture when pushed through a high-pressure homogenizer and pumped hundreds of feet through stainless steel piping.

What you see

A sauce that was thick and creamy becomes loose and porous. A beverage loses its suspension stability. A dairy system shows phase separation. The microstructure has literally been torn apart.

Scale introduces energy density that does not exist in small batch testing. If your formulation is not engineered for that environment, it will fail under stress.

The Long Run Texture Collapse

Small batch production is short and controlled. Commercial production is continuous and prolonged.

Residence time becomes a critical variable. In large scale manufacturing, product may sit in heated hoppers, holding tanks, or continuous systems for hours instead of minutes.

What goes wrong

Extended heat exposure continues to drive reactions. Starches can over-gelatinize or degrade. Hydrocolloids such as pectin, agar, or carrageenan may lose functional integrity under sustained thermal load. Protein networks can tighten or collapse.

In extruded or baked products, moisture and heat exposure over long runs can weaken structural frameworks that are essential for expansion and crispness.

What you see

The first production run looks excellent. By the time you are thousands of units in, texture shifts. Crisp snacks become dense. Gels become brittle or synerese. Viscosity drifts out of specification.

This is not a random event. It is a time-dependent structural failure driven by prolonged processing conditions.

Water Activity Drift

Moisture content and water activity are not the same thing.

Moisture content tells you how much water is present. Water activity, or aw, tells you how much of that water is available to support microbial growth or migrate between components.

In small batch testing, short timelines can mask moisture migration issues. Commercial products experience weeks or months of distribution before reaching the consumer.

What goes wrong

Water moves. It always moves toward equilibrium. In a filled pastry, moisture migrates from the fruit layer into the crust. In a multi-component snack, the soft inclusions equilibrate with the dry base.

If aw rises above 0.85, you cross a critical regulatory and safety threshold for shelf stable products. What was once safe in short term testing may become microbiologically vulnerable.

What you see

Soggy bases. Rock hard fillings. Mold growth in products that were assumed shelf stable. Unexpected spoilage during shelf life studies.

Water activity management is not optional at scale. It must be engineered into the system from the beginning.

Fill Weight Variability: The Profit Killer

When you hand-pack jars, you have control. You can visually confirm fill levels. You can correct inconsistencies.

At commercial speeds, fillers operate rapidly and rely on predictable flow behavior. Even a two-gram deviation, multiplied across thousands of units, materially impacts margin.

What goes wrong

Products that do not flow consistently through volumetric or piston fillers create variability. Powders can bridge. Viscous products can string. Particulates can clog valves.

If the filler compensates by overfilling to stay compliant, you experience product give-away. If it underfills, you risk short-weight violations and retailer penalties.

What you see

Eroded margins from chronic overfill. Rejected lots. Retail compliance issues. Cost structures that no longer support your pricing model.

Flow properties must be validated under real manufacturing conditions. Otherwise, profitability becomes an unintended casualty of scale.

Packaging Interactions

Packaging is not just a container. It is a functional barrier system.

At small scale, many founders choose stock packaging to reduce cost and complexity. At commercial scale, the interaction between your product and its packaging becomes a technical variable that can compromise quality.

What goes wrong

High-fat systems can absorb or “scalp” flavor compounds from packaging materials. High-acid products can challenge seal integrity. Oxygen transmission rates that were ignored in early stages begin to matter over six months of storage.

Barrier properties, headspace oxygen, and liner compatibility all influence product stability.

What you see

Oxidation. Rancidity. Metallic off-notes. Seal failures. Premature staling long before the labeled shelf life.

A technically sound formulation can still fail if the packaging is not engineered to protect it.

The Real Lesson: Scaling Is Applied Food Physics

The most frustrating part of hitting the “scaling wall” is that it’s rarely about a bad idea. Usually, the product didn’t fail because of the recipe—it failed because the physics changed.

Commercial manufacturing is a totally different beast. Between intense mechanical pressure, longer heating times, and high-speed automation, variables emerge that you just can’t see in a test kitchen.

Success at scale requires translation, not just duplication.

The brands that actually win aren’t always the ones with the most “creative” recipes; they’re the ones that respect the science of mass production and design for it from day one.

At Patric Food and Beverage Development, this is what we do every day. We bridge the gap between your kitchen-table concept and commercial reality, ensuring the product you fell in love with is the same one that ends up in the customer’s cart.

Ready to scale without the heartbreak? Let’s talk about your formulation.

The Top 4 Challenges U.S. Food Manufacturers Will Face in 2026

January 12, 2026 by Kristen Nicoletti

The U.S. food manufacturing landscape continues to evolve quickly, but 2026 is shaping up to be a year where several major pressures converge. Regulatory requirements are expanding, packaging rules are becoming more complex, labeling timelines are tightening, and supply chain volatility remains a constant.

For many manufacturers, the challenge will not be a single change. It will be the need to manage multiple changes at once, without disrupting production, customer commitments, or food safety systems.

Below are the top four challenges food manufacturers should be preparing for in 2026 and what they mean in practical terms.

1) Traceability requirements and customer expectations are accelerating

Traceability is no longer a future-facing topic. Even as regulatory timelines evolve, the expectation that manufacturers can quickly produce accurate, lot-level records has already become common across retail, foodservice, and audit environments.

In practice, stronger traceability requirements often require more than adding a few new records. They drive process and system changes across procurement, receiving, production, warehousing, and distribution.

Key impacts include:

More detailed recordkeeping for incoming ingredients and outgoing finished goods
Stronger control of lot codes, rework tracking, and inventory movements
Better coordination with suppliers and co-manufacturers to align data formats and documentation
Faster record retrieval for investigations, withdrawals, and recall events

For many teams, the hardest part is not collecting data. It is building a consistent system that is reliable under pressure and works across multiple sites and partners.

2) Packaging compliance will be more complicated and more state-driven

Packaging is increasingly shaped by regulatory pressure, particularly at the state level. Manufacturers selling across multiple states may face rules that differ by region, creating additional requirements for packaging specifications, vendor documentation, and compliance verification.

Packaging compliance issues can affect manufacturers even when the product formula does not change. The package itself can create risk, especially when there are restrictions or reporting requirements tied to food contact materials.

In 2026, manufacturers may need to:

Evaluate packaging materials for restricted substances, including PFAS-related concerns
Manage state-by-state compliance for distributed products
Confirm vendor documentation is current and defensible
Address packaging changes without interrupting distribution or increasing waste from obsolete inventory

This is one of the areas where the workload often lands across multiple departments, including regulatory, procurement, marketing, and operations.

3) Labeling change cycles are becoming tighter and more disruptive

Labeling updates are a normal part of food manufacturing, but uniform compliance dates and evolving expectations are increasing the operational burden. Label updates often require synchronized planning across regulatory review, artwork revision, print scheduling, inventory management, and retailer communication.

Even small label changes can create major disruption when multiple products or packaging formats are involved.

Manufacturers should expect labeling updates to require:

More time to manage cross-functional approvals
Better version control and documentation
Careful inventory planning to avoid write-offs or stranded packaging stock
Coordination between labeling requirements and supplier or formula changes

A labeling update can become costly when it overlaps with packaging compliance changes or ingredient substitutions caused by supply chain issues.

4) Cost volatility and sourcing disruption will continue to stress compliance systems

Supply chain conditions remain unstable across many categories, and food manufacturing is especially sensitive to shifts in ingredient availability, packaging supply, and import pricing. Cost pressures can create frequent supplier changes and substitutions, which can introduce compliance and quality risks if change control processes are not strong.

Common risk points include:

Substituting ingredients or suppliers without updating documentation, specifications, or labeling
Switching packaging materials without verifying state-level compliance
Introducing new suppliers without strong qualification steps
Losing track of records when products move across facilities, co-packers, or distributors

In 2026, manufacturers that can move quickly while maintaining control will have a competitive advantage. That requires disciplined change control, aligned teams, and documentation that can keep pace with operational realities.

What manufacturers can do now to reduce risk in 2026

Manufacturers that handle these challenges well usually focus on a few foundational practices:

Clear ownership of traceability records and record retrieval processes
A packaging governance process that ties together compliance, procurement, and brand needs
A structured labeling workflow that prevents rushed changes late in the cycle
Strong change control practices for suppliers, ingredients, packaging, and labeling
Training that helps teams understand the “why” behind requirements, not just the steps

These are not glamorous projects, but they prevent expensive disruptions later.

How we can help

Many food manufacturers already have strong teams in place. The challenge in 2026 will be bandwidth, coordination, and making sure systems can handle multiple changes at once.

We help manufacturers build practical solutions that fit real operations, including:

Reformulations to improve clean label ingredients list
Reformulations to streamline processes
Reformulations to minimize risk of supplier shortages
Ingredient sourcing to speed up supplier changes when needed
Labeling transition planning, including regulatory review

Whether a business needs a targeted compliance review or a longer-term roadmap, we help teams reduce risk, improve clarity, and stay ahead of the changes shaping 2026.

10 Reasons You Need a Food Science Lab for R&D

December 5, 2023 by Alan McClure

As a shrewd and effective entrepreneur in the food industry, you probably face important choices every day. Concerns about budget, quality, safety, production, market demands…

And of course most importantly—enchanting your customers with deliciousness.

You may be wondering whether you really need a fullbore food science lab for your product development and R&D needs. Whether it’s worth the cost (or we prefer “investment” but we’ll get to that).

So what makes food science consultants stand out?

Well in addition to the incalculable experience, training, and molecular creativity earned through years of practice with the best equipment and the top culinary masters of our age…there are also some easily tangible tools & techniques for culinary R&D that only food scientists like us can offer.

Seriously, come visit the lab! We have lots of cool stuff to show you (and let you taste)…

In the meantime, here are just 10 of the many things you definitely won’t get with your run-of-the-mill food development consultant.

1. Spinzall – The magic merry-go-round of food science

This compact centrifuge is a maestro of the trade, breaking down mixtures into component parts; spinning a liquid at high speed to segregate its materials by density.

For example, a liquid such as lemon juice can separate into fruit solids, clarified juice, and citrus oils (also known as pellet, supernate, and oil layers, respectively).

By separating ingredients into their core components, the Spinzall centrifuge opens doors to understanding and manipulating food on a molecular level. It’s a stepping stone for crafting novel textures and flavors that tickle the taste buds in new, exhilarating ways:

Clarify juices for full flavor but a crystal-clear appearance
Extract essential oils from herbs
Remove suspended solids that can separate and/or spoil over time

The Spinzall is crucial for innovating textures, flavors, and new culinary creations—but it can also play a role in quality control and ensuring consistency across batches.

By separating undesired particles and elements that affect flavor or shelf-life, it makes sure there’s nothing in your final product except pure goodness.

So the next time you marvel at the crystal clarity of a beverage or the unique texture of a modernist cuisine dish—remember, there may be a Spinzall and a team of curious food scientists behind the scenes, spinning their magic to elevate your culinary experience beyond the expected.

2. Analytical Balance – The art of precision

This ain’t your science teacher’s balance scale. It’s not even your college pot-dealer’s fancy digital scale.

The analytical balance we use in our food-science R&D lab measures mass down to the 10,000th of a gram. Put it this way: your typical high-quality digital scale can measure differences down to 0.01 grams. Our analytical balance measures down to 0.0001 grams

It’s so precise, it has to sit on a marble table, lest the room’s vibrations and air currents disrupt the measurement.

Dose small quantities of powerful ingredients with extreme accuracy.
Hit that accuracy with extreme precision, which means that measurement after measurement gives you the same result.
Protect the measurement from error introduced by building vibration and/or airflow

This level of precision may not seem important when it comes to playing around with individual recipes—but when you scale up for production, you multiply every factor by some order of magnitude. Which can make any small deviations in measurement quite impactful.

3. Psychrometer – Take the pulse of humidity

Turning from the material to the atmospheric side of food—the humble yet important psychrometer measures moisture in the air, which plays a pivotal role in the food we enjoy.

A Psychrometer comprises two thermometers; one dry and one wet. By comparing the temperature differential, it calculates the ambient humidity, which factors into food science on many levels.

Moisture influences how ingredients meld, the texture of food, and even its shelf life—so understanding how products behave at various humidity levels is crucial for developing tasty treats people can enjoy anywhere.

In a food science R&D lab, a psychrometer helps maintain carefully controlled environments to study and adjust for these important factors, ensuring that each bite delivers the experience your customers are hoping for.

Perfect the crunch of a chip
Ensure the right softness in bread
Extend the shelf life of packaged products

Managing humidity is key also for quality control. Think about what might happen if the humidity in your production facility was different from where you developed your recipe—that means the moisture content of your finished product doesn’t match your R&D, and you have no real control over what shows up in front of your customer.

We shudder to imagine…

4. Food Dehydrator – Leather it up

Ever marveled at the lasting texture of dried fruits or the savory intensity of jerky? A food dehydrator uses air circulation and sometimes low heat to evaporate moisture from foods, leaving behind morsels with condensed flavors, unique textures, and much longer shelf life.

Create healthy snacks that won’t go bad
Preserve seasonal produce for year-round enjoyment
Make high-quality dried herbs

By reducing moisture, a food dehydrator creates an unfriendly environment for bacteria and molds, which helps make perishable items last much longer.

The next time you enjoy a delicious dried apple slice or a toothsome piece of jerky—remember there’s a food dehydrator and maybe a food scientist or two monitoring the drying process carefully, measuring things like moisture content, water activity, and microbial activity, to bring forth the best product possible.

5. Chemical Dryer – A magic wand of waterlessness

A chemical dryer like ours uses gentle vacuum conditions to remove moisture from a substance with minimal heat, which reduces any unwanted chemical changes.

Its primary use is to convert various chemical hydrates (having water) to anhydrous compounds (without water), which can then be used for their functional properties. For example, epsom salt is a hydrate in its standard form. But in its anhydrous form it can be used to pull moisture out of other solvents to help purify them, when even small amounts of moisture can be a problem.

Dehydrate delicate substances that can’t tolerate heat or convection air currents
Remove all moisture when even minute amounts can be a problem
Complete the process of any ethanol-based solvent.

It’s much more gentle than a drying oven or even a dehydrator. Though our chemical dryer has the option to use low heat as well, for certain circumstances.

6. Water Purification – Tapping into elemental magic

When formulating beverages, we like to start from scratch with pure H20—to make sure every potential flavor factor is under our control from the start.

In our R&D lab, municipal water flows through several steps to remove any existing minerals, chemicals, or other impurities:

Water softener
Activated charcoal filter
Reverse osmosis system
Deionizer

Then we can add carbonation if that’s the kind of beverage we’re formulating, followed by any minerals or other flavor additives we want in the finished product, in very specific and controlled amounts.

But the important thing is that throughout the beverage development process, we control every aspect of the ingredient that represents the vast majority of the recipe: Water!

Read more about our food lab’s water purification setup at our sister site.

7. Sonicator – The sound bath & the fury

A Sonicator uses ultrasonic waves to stir up a storm on a microscopic level, breaking down cells, mixing ingredients more thoroughly than a blender, or dispersing flavor particles evenly through liquids.

The Sonicator transforms electrical energy into useful mechanical energy by pushing soundwaves through an aqueous medium at various frequencies depending on what you need. The effect is powerful enough that it can form cavitation bubbles in pure water!

Create stable emulsions
Extract compounds from plants or other tissue
Dissolve chemical compounds incredibly efficiently

This machine uniquely lets us blend and mix at high frequency without the spinning effect caused by other methods. And unlike blenders, doesn’t incorporate any oxygen into the mix—in fact, it forces dissolved gasses out! This means that when oxidation is a potential issue, sonication is the go-to option.

8. The Vortex Mixer – Whirling wonder of agitation

The Vortex Mixer is a simple padded arm that holds a container of liquid. The pad oscillates at specific frequencies to swirl the liquid at precise high speeds (in the thousands of RPM).

Think of a wine aficionado swirling a glass by the stem to “breathe” or incorporate air into the wine for deeper enjoyment of its phenols and flavors.

Our Vortex Mixer does that, but at a speed that would make any sommelier weep. All in the name of uniform mixing, without the blade of a blender.

Dissolve compounds more quickly
Break up centrifuge pellets
Mix highly viscous substances in a controlled space such as a centrifuge tube or test tube.

Compared to the Sonicator and other methods, it mixes incredibly quickly—just seconds sometimes. The Vortex Mixer also has an option to add vibration along with the swirling oscillation, which further helps randomize the mixing motion.

9. Induction Burner – Harnessing invisible power

Induction burner in our food science lab

Ahh the induction burner—a modern marvel that brings the power of magnetic fields to the stage of culinary science.

Induction burners electromagnetically excite the electrons in steel pots and pans to warm their contents without flames or direct heat.

The whole container heats evenly, reducing hot spots and burn points, and cooking what’s inside more quickly and consistently than other burners.

Cook sauces without breaking.
Boil much faster than than other methods.
Reduce delicate fruit purees without burning or sticking.

Induction burners offer precise control over temperature, as well as much better energy efficiency than traditional cooktops. They also help make the lab safer—because once you remove the metal implement, the induction surface is no longer active, and cools quickly to the touch.

10. Thermomix: The culinary composer

The Thermomix is a marvel that can blend, chop, mince, stir, cook, steam, weigh, and more—all while maintaining total control over temperature and time. It conducts a symphony of precision and versatility, choreographing the ingredients to fulfill their exact and utmost potential in a recipe.

Knead dough & mix batter
Perfect confectionery recipes
Create beverages with unique properties

Simply program it with the process you want, weigh in the right ingredients, and the machine handles the rest with precision and accuracy…so the attending scientist/chef/creator can focus on other more important work than watching the pot.

The Food Science Wizard – Pulling the strings of theory

Okay yes, there’s an eleventh reason that unifies them all together. Welcome to the most intangible dimension of why food science R&D delivers results that other consumable consultants simply can’t measure up to. The least quantifiable, most important factor of the entire food science R&D process.

The scientist him/herself.

You can’t really measure the impact of creativity or lived experience. You can’t quantify inspiration, nor the random connections that spring up in the active mind of a deeply trained and educated expert.

We didn’t get into this field because we love equipment. We got into it because we love food, and want to know every little detail of how it works and how to make it better—down to a molecular level.

We develop our science and collect these and other incredibly valuable food-lab tools…but the real power driving what we do for people who want to sell consistent deliciousness to their customers, is our creativity. Both in problem-solving and product development.

Let us know what you’re working on, and we’ll be glad to teach you more about what we do!

Nutraceutical R&D: Beverage Formulation Station

October 30, 2023 by Alan McClure

If you visit the Patric Development food science lab, there’s a lot to take in. We have innumerable gadgets and special machines for developing the best recipes possible; for any kind of edible you can imagine.

But first: How about a nice cold glass of sparkling water on tap?

And this is sparkling water like you’ve never tasted it…highly carbonated, crystal clear, and very refreshing on the palate.

Well that’s just one of the unique features that makes our food science lab stand out from most food and beverage consultants.

We’re here to serve.

But did we install a multi-thousand dollar system just to make the best, cleanest, perfect pH club soda for visitors?

No, of course not. It also serves a much deeper purpose…

Why do we have a state-of-the-art water purification system?

The main reason we set up this complex water station is to help with our initial prototyping stages of beverage formulation.

This is where we test flavor combinations, mouthfeel, bitterness, etc, when developing a nutraceutical, energy drink, or other beverage concept.

And we want to start with water that’s totally pure. Cleared of any naturally occurring (e.g., minerals) or added compounds (e.g., chloramine) besides H2O that might affect how it tastes and how it interacts with other ingredients.

So here’s what happens to our water before it flows out of the tap:

Water softener

First we pass the very hard municipal water through a water softener. This gets rid of calcium, iron, and other minerals that might impact pH, flavor, etc.

You may not think of minerals as impacting flavor—but consider the experience of drinking distilled water compared to a bottle of mineral water. Not only does it taste very different, but it feels different and quenches thirst differently too.

Trust the experts: we did a blind tasting of several market mineral waters, reverse-osmosis waters, and distilled water—and came to an important conclusion:

If you’re going to make a product that’s mostly water, then the mineral profile is a variable you definitely want full control over in the formulation and development process.

The activated charcoal water softener also removes any chlorine/chloramine, which can damage reverse osmosis membranes (where the water flows next).

Reverse osmosis (RO)

This process basically pushes water through a specialized membrane that filters out even more than the activated charcoal does (but it’s also more delicate). Running the two methods in sequence results in water approaching ~95% the purity of distilled water—but without all the hassle of distilling, collecting, and storing.

Deionizing cartridge

If we need even higher purity thresholds, we pass the RO water through a deionizing (DI) cartridge to remove the very last stragglers from the previous processes (e.g., silicas, nitrates, phosphates) attaining 99.9%+ pure water.

Now we have the equivalent of unlimited distilled water on-demand, cutting out plastic containers and deliveries and wasted energy and materials.

Then once we’ve put in all that hard work to create pure water, we can start adding things back in to build the foundations we want for our R&D projects.

Forced carbonation

In this step we add pressurized CO2, which dissolves in the water. This is called “forced” carbonation, as opposed to byproduct carbonation (like in fermentation).

It’s set to extra high carbonation; both because we like the taste and mouthfeel of it that way—but also because it will result in a prototype that’s actually characteristic of your final product, compared to starting with regular carbonated water which would turn out something kind of flat and lifeless.

This part of our beverage station is optional, and there are plenty of instances where we wouldn’t add carbonation.

For example, a vegetable supplement breakfast drink probably wouldn’t taste great carbonated…so in that case we’d bypass this step and move on to start playing with emulsions to make sure your ingredients don’t separate and settle.

So, like everything else we offer, it all depends on what you’re trying to achieve.

Chilling plate

Before it hits the tap, our room-temperature water runs through a chilling plate to get it quickly and quite literally ice cold and ready to serve.

This way we can develop prototypes that match the conditions of consumption. Because even if your nutraceutical or energy drink is shelf-stable, chances are American consumers will still want to enjoy it cold. It’s just so much more refreshing that way. So that’s where we start.

This step means that we’re getting into the shoes of your consumer—from the earliest stages of beverage formulation. Which ultimately results in a tastier, more enjoyable product for your customers.

What our formulation beverage station means for you

Why should you care about any of this?

Well if we didn’t take all these steps, and just used regular filtered water for prototyping, there would be slight differences in the final recipe, depending on the water you used for production. This would undermine consistency, which is vital for successful production and scaling.

But more important than that, it’s because all this precision helps us formulate a recipe that guarantees your emulsions don’t break or other ugly outcomes—by testing and controlling things like pH, brix, turbidity (cloudiness), and viscosity/mouthfeel, as well as assuring that ingredient profiles allow for shelf-life expectations and labeling targets.

Not a lot of beverage R&D labs can offer that kind of comprehensive prototyping and precision beverage formulation. But if you want to develop a scalable nutraceutical, energy drink, or other beverage that’s ready for market and comparable to any of the top brands, it’s a critical investment that will save time and money later down the line.

Gelling Agents for Nutraceutical Gummies

September 18, 2023 by Alan McClure

We’ve come a long way from the Flintstones chewables we grew up on. Fortunately for all of us, we’re entering a golden age of gourmet vitamins, dietary supplements, and other nutraceuticals.

That’s why you’re here, right? To make people’s lives a little easier, and a tad tastier?

Well here’s some free food-science knowledge from true kitchen nerds about one of the key elements you’ll have to decide upon for your nutraceutical gummy formulation.

Do yourself a favor and save yourself some time in your nutraceutical product development by spending a moment here with experts who’ve already done the research for you…

As a pioneer in the nutraceutical industry, it’s understandable that you won’t settle for creating anything less than a delicious, effective, consistent product.

Before we dive into the science of gelling agents for nutraceutical gummies—to discover why your gummy keeps coming out overly chewy, bland, or unpredictable—let’s do a quick introduction just to make sure we’re all in the right room.

What are nutraceutical products?

Nutraceutical products are edible dietary supplements that provide a physiological benefit aside from regular nutrition.

As a nutraceutical innovator, you likely already know that the possible benefits of nutraceuticals are almost infinite. Businesses like yours are creating and perfecting nutraceutical products even as you read this, to provide myriad benefits like managing disease, sleep, mental health, and allergies!

Some of the most popular nutraceutical gummies on the market include:

CBD edibles
Vitamins
Melatonin supplements
Compound pharmacy meds
Dietary supplements

While the popularity of nutraceuticals is on the rise in general, nutraceutical gummies, specifically, are by far outpacing other products in the nutraceutical industry. In fact, the gummy supplement industry has grown by more than 80% in the last two years!

Even in the cannabis world, 71.1% of edible sales in the US are gummies.

The people have spoken –they want a gummy and they expect it to be good. Whoever it is you’re hoping to help with your nutraceutical gummy, investing in perfecting the formula to ensure your product stacks up against the steep competition can make all the difference to your success.

So how do you make a good nutraceutical product – specifically, a great gummy?

Since you’re here, you probably already know the therapeutic benefits you want from your nutraceutical gummies, and maybe you’ve even decided what flavor you want them to be—nice work.

But what about your gelling agent? As benign as the choice may seem, your gelling agent is the single gummy ingredient voted most likely to separate the great gummy from the “meh” gummy.

Why are there so many types of gelling agents for nutraceutical gummies?

If in your product development journey so far you’ve peeked behind the curtain of what goes into crafting the perfect gummy, you’ve seen that the list of possible gelling agents for nutraceutical gummies is long; pectin, gelatin, agar and many more—what’s the difference?

The reason there are so many types of gelling agents in the nutraceutical industry is that each one has its own unique benefits and drawbacks—depending on what you’re trying to accomplish.

The right gelling agent for nutraceutical gummies depends on the functional purpose of the gummy (what benefit does your nutraceutical provide its consumer), the desired texture and flavor (how important is the “yum” factor), your own familiarity with the critical handling techniques of the agent, and whether the nutraceutical is a vegan or clean-label product.

What’s the best gelling agent for your nutraceutical gummies?

To answer that, put on your food scientist hat for a moment and ask yourself these other questions first:

What are you making and what other ingredients are you using that may interact with the gelling agent?
What are your priorities (flavor release, mouthfeel, simplicity, being vegan, temperature stability)?
What temperature are you heating your mixture to?
How comfortable are you handling finicky ingredients?
Do you have flexibility to mold at different temperature conditions?
Do you have a stoving room to remove excess gummy moisture?

You know your nutraceutical gummy needs better than anyone, so take a look at this chart of 7 common gelling agents, and get ready to conquer the nutraceutical industry.

Below you’ll find the most popular gelling agents for nutraceutical gummies, including pectin, gelatin, agar, carrageenan, gellan gum, and acacia gum. Take a look at the benefits and drawbacks of each agent to help you balance your unique priorities and develop the perfect product.

7 Different gelling agents for nutraceutical gummies:

Pectin

Source: Plant tissues, (especially apples and citrus)

Varieties: High-methoxyl and low methoxyl (and many subcategories)

Benefits:

Heat stability
Excellent flavor release
Many varieties including fast- and slow-set

Drawbacks:

Tricky product handling
Sensitive to calcium and other cations

Vegan: Yes

Gelatin

Source: Beef, pig, fish

Varieties: Alkaline- or acid- extracted; Different strengths

Benefits: Very bouncy and classic like gummy bears

Drawbacks:

Terrible flavor release
Not heat-stable
Sensitive to acid

Vegan: No

Agar

Source: Seaweed

Varieties: Seasonality leads to different strengths

Benefits:

Easy to work with
Good heat stability

Drawbacks:

Sensitive to acid
Poor flavor release
Brittle gel

Vegan: Yes

Carrageenan

Source: Seaweed

Varieties: Harvested from several types of seaweed (Kappa, Iota, Lambda)

Benefits:

Varies by type (some gel and some don’t; some have good heat stability, some don’t)
A decent mimic for gelatin

Drawbacks:

Mediocre flavor-release
Harder to work with than gelatin
Sensitive to acid
Sensitive to cations
Bad press lately re: health effects

Vegan: Yes

Gellan gum

Source: Bacteria

Varieties: High-Acyl and Low-Acyl (very different characteristics)

Benefits: Varies by type (some gel and some don’t; some have good heat stability and some don’t)

Drawbacks:

Not great mouthfeel
Gel is brittle

Vegan: Generally considered vegetarian, but produced by bacteria (technically an animal)

Acacia gum

Source: Tree sap

Varieties: Incorrect species can be harvested

Benefits: Distinct chewy texture that is not truly a gel

Drawbacks: Off flavors are common due to impurities or incorrect species being harvested

Vegan: Yes

Starch

Source: Grain products

Varieties: Infinite varieties depending on ratios of amylose:amylopectin and whether the starch is modified and how

Benefits: Varies by type (some gel and some don’t; can have very distinct chewy characteristic unmatched by any other agent)

Drawbacks:

Characteristics are all over the map due to infinite varieties
Modified versions aren’t seen as “clean label
Often requires special high-pressure jet cookers

Vegan: Yes

What happens if you use the wrong gelling ingredient?

The good news is that even if you’re not a food scientist and you mistakenly choose the wrong gelling agent for your product during R&D, you’ll most likely just end up with a melted, sticky mess. Or maybe a bitter, brittle mishap. No one is gonna get hurt because of your chemistry project gone awry.

However, we know that the long process of trial and error in product development can get old fast if you’re ready to start sharing your awesome product with people who need your help as soon as possible. That’s why some business owners like you decide to skip the kitchen experimentation and focus more time on the real mission: helping people feel better with your gummy.

Our food scientists are always ready to help when it comes to choosing the right gelling agent for a nutraceutical gummy, or even a blend of multiple gelling agents! That’s right, some of them can be used together to particularly good effect for certain challenging issues.

If you’re excited to share the benefits of nutraceuticals and elevate your customer’s experience, selecting the right gelling agent for your gummy is an absolute must!

Want to avoid some of the typical trial and error associated with this process? Go ahead and ask the questions only a food scientist would be able to answer: Contact us here!

Bitterness in Beverage Formulation

July 2, 2023 by Alan McClure

The beverage industry has witnessed a remarkable transformation in recent years, with an influx of small businesses dedicated to creating high-quality, smaller-batch products. This diversification has led to an explosion of unique flavors and ingredients, pushing the boundaries of traditional beverage offerings.

Once upon a time, a “soft drink” was basically water, sugar (often corn syrup), flavoring, color, and maybe caffeine.

Believe it or not, Coke and Sprite are essentially the same recipe—except for a touch of herbal flavor and that iconic caramel coloring (plus the caffeine of course).

Fortunately, creative beverage producers have broken free of the mold, reaching for new heights of uniqueness and ingredient use. But along with this delightful new turn in gourmet and high-quality beverages, comes a huge increase in the importance of understanding bitterness.

One of the 5 basic taste categories, bitterness can add complexity and depth to beverages, though it can also turn off consumers for various reasons. Sometimes bitterness is part of the charm. Lots of delicious common beverages are bitter: coffee, tea, beer, tonic water, wine, grapefruit juice, numerous classic cocktails…

But when bitterness isn’t desired, or when it’s poorly balanced, it can be quite unpleasant for the consumer—especially for those unfortunate (but not uncommon) folks called “super tasters” who have high bitter sensitivity due to genetic contribution. Not so “super” for drink manufacturers…but fortunately there are plenty of ways to handle bitterness, even for the extrasensitive.

So let’s talk about naturally occurring bitterness in beverages, and the different ingredients that contribute to this controversial taste sensation.

How do you measure bitterness in foods & beverages?

Beer drinkers are readily familiar with IBUs. It’s an easy way of helping customers narrow their choices based on how bitter they prefer their beer.

However the IBU is not a measurement of perceived bitterness; but rather the amount of iso-alpha acid (derived from hops) that’s dissolved in the solution, where 1 IBU = 1 ppm (or 1 mg/L).

So it only works with beer. And it’s really only a rough indicator, because you can sweeten a high-IBU beer to a point that it no longer tastes bitter, but still has a high concentration of iso-alpha acids.

Another, more generalized way of measuring bitterness is Bitterness value, which is based on the smallest concentration of 1 gram of a substance dissolved in water, that can still be tasted as bitter.

This scale centers around the perceived bitterness of quinine (an alkaloid extracted from chinchona bark) which still delivers a bitter taste all the way to 1 g dissolved in 2 liters2000 mL of water.

On that scale, quinine has a bitterness value of 200,000. Pure caffeine has a similar value, though somewhat less.

And by the way, the most bitter natural substance is gentian root, which boasts a bitterness value of 58 million. Which means 1g of gentian extract can bitter up to 58,000 liters of water! That’s enough to fill a 9 x 4 meter backyard pool!

While this scale provides a numerical value for bitterness, it is crucial to remember that taste perception is highly subjective, influenced by personal preference and biological factors such as individual tastebud distribution and age.

What ingredients add bitterness to foods & beverages?

For beverage products like nutraceuticals, energy drinks, and carbonated soft drinks—whether clean-label or otherwise—there are a lot of ways to get the flavors and effects you want to give to your customers.

But many of these natural ingredients are inherently bitter, and require some kind of bitterness management.

Stimulants

Natural stimulant ingredients like caffeine, theobromine (found in cacao and small amounts in tea & coffee), mateine (found in yerba mate), and guaranine (found in guarana) can impart bitterness to beverages.

While these compounds are known for their uplifting effects, their bitterness can vary depending on factors such as the roast level of coffee beans or the percentage of cacao in chocolate.

Fun fact: when training for expert sensory analysis of bitterness, the reference material used is a solution of pure caffeine.

Alcohol

Ethanol (drinking alcohol) is a naturally bitter compound. The method of producing, refining, and aging the ultimate product contributes to the character and level of bitterness—because of compounds such as tannins, phenols, and hop-derived extracts. Which are responsible for the underlying bitterness balanced to perfection (one hopes) in wines, spirits, and beers.

Herbal & botanical bitterness

Many of the most common herbs & botanicals used for creating clean-label flavors add an element of bitterness. And some may surprise you, because their bitterness is usually balanced by other elements (cinnamon, for example, adds bitterness but we usually associate it with desserts).

Classic bitter beverage ingredients:

Chamomile
Dandelion
Citrus peels
Rhubarb
Grapefruit
Cranberry
Quinine
Wormwood
Gentian root

These natural compounds can add complexity and desirable astringency to a beverage formulation, but they can also be overdone to disastrous effect. (Ever leave cinnamon sticks too long in your hot cider? Yech!)

Cannabinoids

With the increasing popularity of cannabis-infused beverages, it’s important to understand how cannabinoids like THC and CBD, can introduce bitterness to a recipe. You can’t just add cannabis extract to your recipe and send it out. There’s work to do first…

Ways to balance & mask bitterness in beverage products

Creating a well-balanced and enjoyable beverage that’s more than just sugar, water, and artificial flavors, generally requires some degree of bitterness management.

There are three main ways to approach this:

Flavor (aroma) synergy:

Combining bitter ingredients with complementary aromas (often mis-termed as “flavors”), can help balance the overall gustatory profile. Aromas can add pleasant associations and context to bitterness.

For example, herbal bitterness can be mellowed by incorporating fruity or floral notes (a la strawberry/rhubarb). Grapefruit aroma is also particularly adept at making bitter beverage elements seem fitting and balanced. This synergy can create a more harmonious and pleasant flavor experience overall.

Taste synergy:

The term “taste” technically refers to the 5 types of flavor receptors we have: bitter, sweet, sour, salty, and umami. This method of balancing bitterness factors in foundational ingredients that bring taste but not aroma; like sugar, citric acid, water, and salt.

By carefully selecting and blending ingredients, beverage creators can manipulate the balance of bitterness. Different ratios and combinations of bitter and counterpart tastes (such as sugar) can lead to a well-balanced flavor profile, ensuring that bitterness does not overpower the drink. Skillful blending can result in a nuanced taste that appeals to a wide range of palates.

Bitterness suppression

Some ingredients have the ability to mask, diminish, or suppress the bitter taste of others. This includes simple, time-honored tricks—as well as high-level food-science techniques.

As you surely know, beverage producers all too often take the easy route—using large amounts of high-intensity sweeteners like stevia or monkfruit extract; which can help blot out bitterness while still maintaining a desirable level of sweetness. However, many consumers are quite sensitive to such non-nutritive sweeteners, which often carry off-flavors of their own (expecially at higher concentrations) sometimes even adding MORE bitterness to the aftertaste. So use with caution, and test via consumer analysis.

Getting more advanced; microencapsulation is a food chemistry technology that encloses bitter compounds within a hollow sugar molecule that prevents them from interacting with taste receptors on their way to the stomach, where the encapsulation readily breaks down.

This technique is especially useful for cannabis edibles, where you want those active ingredients to digest into the bloodstream, but not impart their highly bitter characteristics.

Don’t leave bitterness up to chance

Bitterness, though subjective, plays a crucial role in creating complex and intriguing flavor profiles in beverages and other foods. Understanding the ingredients that contribute to bitterness and using effective techniques to balance or mask it, is key to developing exceptional beverage products that keep your customers coming back for more.

However, crafting a quality beverage recipe formulation that effectively addresses bitterness requires expertise and an understanding of the science behind taste perception.

In this era of small businesses creating high-quality, smaller-batch products, the expertise of a food scientist can elevate your beverage offerings and help you stand out in a ridiculously crowded market.

An experienced food science consultant (not necessarily me—but I do have 20 years of award-winning formulation experience working with highly bitter ingredients) can help you develop innovative and market-ready beverages that fix bitterness naturally, while meeting consumer demands.

Want to develop a beverage that captivates the taste buds while addressing bitterness effectively? Reach out and let’s talk about how we can create a truly exceptional beverage formulation.

Nutraceutical Food Scientist vs ChatGPT Gummies – Part 1

April 4, 2023 by Alan McClure

You may have already considered turning to ChatGPT to find new functional food recipes.

If you’ve played around with it and you have any experience with making functional food products such as gummies, you may have noticed some chinks in the armor.

The first and last thing to remember about this program is that it is not sentient. It uses machine learning to sort through everything it can access on the internet–2021 and earlier– and pull an answer that its training says best fits your question.

First I asked ChatGPT 3.5 how to make the best vegan gummy.

It’s a simple, basic question that anyone searching for a gummy recipe might ask, whether it will stand alone, serve a functional role, or even be a medicinal cannabis edible.

I wanted a recipe that doesn’t use any animal-derived ingredient (i.e., no gelatin). I was expecting that ChatGPTwould probably suggest something fruit-flavored because that’s so common in the gummy world.

As far as plant-derived gelling agents go, I know from experience that the three most common are pectin, agar, and starch. For homemade gummies, starch is rarely the choice, as the specialized-for-confectionery modified starches are hard to acquire, and standard starches, like corn starch, doesn’t serve the role as well.

I also thought that if ChatGPT really understood “best” it would offer something with pectin, given the well-known excellent organoleptic characteristics that result from its use.

But this is what it came up with:

Here’s a recipe for making vegan gummies:
Ingredients:
1/2 cup of fruit juice (preferably low pH like lemon juice or orange juice)
1/4 cup of water
1 tablespoon of agar agar powder (a vegan alternative to gelatin)
1/2 teaspoon of citric acid
1/4 teaspoon of salt
Optional: functional ingredient
Equipment:
Silicone gummy molds
Saucepan
Whisk
Dropper or syringe
Instructions:
In a saucepan, mix together the fruit juice, water, agar agar powder, citric acid, and salt.
Whisk the mixture together over low heat until the agar agar powder dissolves completely.
Add the optional functional ingredient.
Remove the saucepan from the heat and let it cool for a few minutes.
Using a dropper or syringe, fill the silicone gummy molds with the mixture.
Place the molds in the refrigerator for 30-60 minutes to let the gummies set.
Once the gummies have set, remove them from the molds and store them in an airtight container in the refrigerator.
That’s it! This recipe should yield about 20-30 gummies, depending on the size of your molds. Make sure to label your gummies and keep them out of reach of children or pets
ChatGPT 3.5

Don’t use this ChatGPT gummy recipe!

TLDR: It will turn out sour and may not even gel.

Let me break down what went wrong, and then I’ll ask it a more specific question.

Precision measuring

Generally speaking, it’s better to measure by mass/weight than by volume. Ingredients tend to vary in density from producer to producer. For example ¼ tsp. salt will have a different mass of salt depending on the grain/flake shape and size. Which can change the flavor drastically, especially when you scale up for market (which you can’t realistically do volumetrically with dry ingredients).

It’s not surprising that ChatGPT pulled a gummy recipe with volume-based measurement. It’s just drawing from what’s available on the internet—which leans toward American preferences, and American households still don’t often have scales in their kitchens. But if you’re making gummies commercially, definitely measure your recipe by weight.

Flavor

It makes sense to see fruit as the basis of this recipe. Fruit juices and purees are common gummy ingredients.

But I am surprised to see it suggest a low pH (high acid) juice like lemon, especially since citric acid (which makes lemon sour) is also included.

People generally prefer their fruit-flavored gummies to be sweet—and there is essentially no sugar in this recipe, especially if you go with lemon juice. But even orange, pineapple, or some other juice would skew toward the sour side…and without adding additional sugar to balance it, I suspect these gummies would taste quite harsh.

Okay but let’s say you’re averse to sugar, or you just like things super sour—there’s still the fact that many functional ingredients are inherently bitter.

As any chef or food scientist knows, bitterness is enhanced by acid and mitigated by sweetness. So a recipe this sour would potentially be unpalatably bitter, without adding ingredients to manage bitterness.

And if we’re talking about flavor, we can’t just talk about sour, bitter, and sweet.

We also have to consider one of the biggest flavor factors in any recipe: aroma! It can’t just be an afterthought.

You have to consider all the ingredients that add aroma to the recipe, and in the case of the ChatGPT one above, there isn’t much. Various extracts from fruit or spices are commonly used to add flavor to cooked confectionery such as gummies. Without them, you can end up with a very boring product. Cooking down lemon or orange juice, for example, results in a kind of “canned” washed-out flavor, and it’s not a good look. But imagine the essence of the zest of a lemon or orange rind, or excellent bourbon vanilla extract. Such ingredients can be used to great effect.

Using agar for gummies

Why did ChatGPT choose agar as a baseline for the gummies? It’s impossible to know for sure, but my guess is that more people use agar because it’s easier to work with and doesn’t require a specific pH range and sugar concentration in order to gel.

Pectin is, for lack of a better word, more difficult.

And if you Google “vegan agar gummy” versus “vegan pectin gummy” you’ll notice there are almost 25% more instances of agar.

Of course more doesn’t mean better. But ChatGPT has no way of knowing that. It has no mouth, taste buds, or experience-based understanding of flavor or mouthfeel.

Also, agar is known for having lots of variability in its gelling capacity, which is apparently based upon regional differences in chemical composition. This means sometimes even batch to batch variation of agar from the same manufacturer might cause noticeable texture differences.

Another major consideration is that agar needs to be heated to dissolve in water—but when acid is also involved, the agar begins to break down; which dramatically reduces its gelling capacity.

In other words step one—which calls for mixing the lemon juice, citric acid, and agar before heating—is not advised.

To do it right you would first cook agar in a sugar solution to a particular temperature or brix, and then cool it down to below 200° F before blending with acidic ingredients.

Because of agar’s flexibility, ChatGPT’s gummy recipe might work—but it would then be using significantly more agar than necessary, and therefore your cost of goods increases for no reason other than following ChatGPT’s wasteful practices.

Home gummy makers may not care, but business owners generally want to avoid wasting one of their more expensive gummy ingredients—when a slight change in process could solve the problem instead.

Remember, every inefficiency or extra cost magnifies significantly when you scale for manufacturing. And by then it’s too late…

Fortunately food science is here to rescue you from that sunk-cost fate.

Shelf life

Remember that absence of sugar and the short cooking time? That adds up to a real short shelf-life, which is related to water activity.

Sugar and salt dampen that activity (so to speak). Without them, even low pH foods can grow mold. Disgusting, yes—but some molds also produce toxins. Which can bring legal trouble on top of the guaranteed ick factor that’ll sink your brand. Can you imagine the Google reviews…?

Unless you want to trust vendors to keep your product refrigerated at all times, you definitely wouldn’t want to use this recipe for commercial purposes.

Always always always run any newly developed products through shelf-life testing. (Ask me how)

How to get a decent gummy recipe from ChatGPT

ChatGPT’s strengths are also its weaknesses. All it does is pull from what already exists online. It’s not actually creating anything truly new. It can’t determine what will work versus what will fall flat and why. It has no sense—it’s just a masterful indexer and data analyzer.

Laying aside its lack of sensory input and actual experience to focus on what does make it a useful tool—one perpetual problem with the program still is that it’s hard to know what you don’t know. Both for the AI itself and for the humans trying to train it to give useful responses.

For example, how could ChatGPT reasonably know that pectin is preferable over agar for its superior flavor release, or that pectin has a more familiar mouthfeel for westerners? We would likely have to force it to consider these issues in our original question, and to do that, we’d have to realize that they are potential problems in the first place, and unless you are a confectionery expert or food scientist, that would be very unlikely information for you to have.

That said, if ChatGPT were trained to take into account issues like flavor release, mouthfeel, flavor profiles, and so forth, it may be able to self-correct. Each new version of ChatGPT leaps closer and closer to truly useful and not just entertaining.

But in the meantime, just remember that better questions can produce better results. (Hey—just like in science!)

So this time I asked ChatGPT:

How to make the best vegan gummy using pectin & granulated sugar, a recipe that will result in gummies that actually set, with a good mouthfeel and flavor. Listing ingredients in metric weights.

And here’s what it came up with:

Ingredients:
250 ml fruit juice of your choice
10 g pectin
200 g granulated sugar
2 g citric acid
2 g vanilla extract
Optional: functional ingredient
Instructions:
In a small saucepan, combine the fruit juice and pectin. Whisk until the pectin is fully dissolved.
Add the sugar to the juice mixture and stir until it’s fully dissolved.
Heat the mixture over low heat and add the citric acid and vanilla extract. Stir well.
Continue heating the mixture over low heat, stirring occasionally, until it reaches 107°C. Use a candy thermometer to measure the temperature.
Remove the mixture from the heat and let it cool for a few minutes.
Add the optional functional ingredient and stir well.
Pour the mixture into a silicone gummy mold, filling each mold about 3/4 full.
Refrigerate the molds for at least an hour or until the gummies are firm.
Remove the gummies from the mold and store them in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to two weeks.
Be sure to label your gummies clearly and keep them out of reach of children and pets.
ChatGPT 3.5

This recipe looks somewhat better—but even at a glance I can tally up several issues that would prevent this from ever exceeding mediocre.

It did get rid of the extra water, which bodes well for shelf life. It also added a thermometer to the process, which is imperative when using pectin (though its heat/time ratio is a problem). And the flavor balance seems much more palatable, with vanilla added for more pronounced flavor.

But again, this recipe is still rife with problems. It would never work as a product for any reputable functional food business. And depending upon the pH of the fruit you choose, it might not even gel, though with the significant amount of pectin called for, it might also gel very firmly.

Read how I solve these problems (and more) in the next chapter of Food Scientist vs ChatGPT – in which I work with a client to develop this gummy recipe into a delicious, high-quality, long-lasting, and viable product for the nutraceutical gummy market.

Follow our LinkedIn for updates & the next installment!

Do I Need a Food Science Consultant? Summary

November 10, 2022 by Alan McClure

Quick Version (3 minutes)

So you’ve come upon a problem in your business that calls for expert help.

Remember: Not all food consultants are created equal

There are a lot of very smart and talented food consultants specializing in various elements of the food and beverage industry.

But when it comes to solving problems they’ve never seen before—even the brightest, most creative food consultants likely don’t have the training or experience to design an effective experiment to figure out exactly why your edible baked good is showing sugar bloom, or set up precise formulation trials to find the best possible recipe for your next CBD gummy release.

What should you consider when hiring a food science consultant?

There are a few things to think about, before reaching out about food science consultation.

Size/Stage of your business

There’s no hard and fast rule, but we generally work with operational companies or startups who already have dedicated budgets for R&D and want to get moving asap.

We may not be the right choice for throwing ideas at the wall and seeing what sticks. Though for a fee we can help you run a formal ideation process to figure out what the best product to start with might be.

For self-funded people hoping to get started with a somewhat smaller budget, let’s talk once you’ve done some preliminary research, have a specific product in mind, and have created a viable business plan with a solid source of R&D funding to get started.

Type of project

Keep in mind that not every project needs the specialization that a food science consultant brings. For example, non-science-based food consultants can help with:

Co-packing (contract packager/manufacturer) searches
Sales & marketing
Branding

But when it comes to the following, we are just what the doctor ordered:

Edible product formulation
Technical problem solving
Facility setup and scaling
Optimizing for multiple objectives
Shelf-life or other food-quality advising

Just remember, as with anything, with food science, you get what you pay for.

High-level specialists always cost a little more—because the returns are much greater.

“I get it, food science is valuable, and I need to budget for it. But what should that budget look like?”

Budget

Every project is different, of course, in terms of time, materials, and expenses like lab fees.

If you’re in a rush, hoping for a silver-bullet solution done cheap, quick, and dirty—then we’re simply not the right choice for the job.

But if you’re on a mission to bore into the very building blocks of whatever obstacle you’re facing—and rearrange it into a stairway to lasting success, tell us here, and we’ll work on a proposal that will take your specific budget and needs fully into consideration, to find a plan with which everyone will be happy.

Do I Need a Food Science Consultant?

September 22, 2022 by Alan McClure

So you’ve come upon a problem in your business that calls for expert help. You’ve browsed some food consultants’ websites and seen a lot of exciting promises and impressive portfolios. But can they help you, or do you need a food science consultant?

Food consultants in general know a lot. And they’ve helped a lot of businesses to achieve success.

But who do you turn to when you don’t know what you need? How do you get the best bang for your buck? What kind of expert should you be looking for?

Well, like all things in craft and science, that depends on several variables.

Not all food consultants are created equal

There are a lot of very smart and talented food consultants specializing in various elements of the food and beverage industry.

Maybe they’ve worked for years at a RTD beverage company, and have a vast body of experience and knowledge, offering incredible consulting value for beverage producers.

Maybe they were a master brewer at a well-known craft brewery, and have tons of insight on fermentation and flavor balance.

Or maybe they’re a marketing genius with a knack for spotting opportunities in the food and beverage market.

But what if you want to scale your gourmet cannabis candy formulation for cost-effective manufacturing?

Or what if you want to remove the alcohol from something that normally has alcohol in it, and still have it taste incredible?

Or let’s say you have a solid customer base and you want to formulate a new product that appeals to the broadest segment of them, meaning delicious with no room for error?

When it comes to solving problems they’ve never seen before—even the brightest, most creative food consultants likely don’t have the training or experience to design an effective experiment to figure out exactly why your edible baked good is showing sugar bloom, or set up precise formulation trials to find the best possible recipe for your next CBD gummy release.

There’s nothing wrong with that limitation—after all, most food consultants don’t have a food science degree, let alone a doctorate in flavor chemistry, resting on a solid foundation of formal experiment design/analysis and sensory-science experience. And as long as they don’t pretend to offer something they can’t, food consultants are an important contributor to the world of edible production.

But the fact is, there are some problems in food and beverage production that can only be solved through rigorous food science. And that’s where a food science consultant comes in.

What to consider when hiring a food science consultant

There are a few things to think about, before reaching out about food science consultation. While we’re always rooting for your success, your situation may not be the best fit for what we do. At least not yet…

Size of your business

There’s no hard and fast rule, but we generally work with medium to larger companies or well-organized startups who have budgets for R&D.

Whether that comes from established revenue streams, or venture capital doesn’t matter as much as the drive to do what it takes to get to the root of whatever we’re trying to solve.

For some projects we may also train members of your team to run certain elements, so we can be as efficient as possible with our direct consultation time. If you have people on your team who you trust to play such a role, we have even more options available. We don’t always need to be on-site for the magic of food science to work.

Business stage

You don’t have to be a 30-year brand for food science consulting to make sense—but we’re generally not the right choice for throwing ideas at the wall and seeing what sticks.

We work with well-funded startups and generational food manufacturers alike, who have a specific challenge or idea they’re hoping to delve into deeply. Food science is about precision and investigation. Not aimless brainstorming.

For self-funded people with a good idea and no idea what’s next…let’s talk once you’ve done some preliminary research, have a specific product in mind, and have created a viable business plan with a solid source of funding to get started.

Type of project

Keep in mind that not every project needs the specialization that a food science consultant brings. For example, you don’t need a food scientist just to outsource the manufacturing of your product. There are plenty of so-called Co Packers set up to do just that, for any type of food you can think of.

Non-science-based food consultants can help with:

Kitchen-to-carton product development
Co-packing (contract packager/manufacturer)
Sales & marketing
Branding

But when it comes to edible product formulation, technical problem solving, scaling, optimizing for multiple objectives, and shelf-life or other food-quality advising—food science offers an array of tools for getting precision results and eliminating expensive guesswork.

Don’t need the power of food science? Here’s a helpful directory of food consultants across a variety of fields.

Budget constraints

Please be clear and upfront about the available budget for your project. This may seem obvious, but you’d be surprised how many people try to prevaricate, hoping for some kind of price match against other food consultant quotes they’ve gathered.

But that ain’t how it works. This is food science. You get what you pay for.

It’s not worth your time for us to get deep into the problem at hand, only to balk at the project proposal price tag. We can help you make the most of your budget, and the quality of our work may seem miraculous to the untrained eye—but we can’t magically make something out of nothing, and we don’t work on spec.

Budget accordingly, and you’ll get the returns you’re looking for.

Why are food science consultants expensive?

Science isn’t simply a body of knowledge. It’s a very specific process for understanding our world by isolating variables and eliminating bias in observation.

It’s not expensive; it’s valuable.

Food science isn’t just fill-in-the-blank. Designing effective experiments requires a lot of experience and creativity. High-level specialists always cost a little more—because the returns can be much greater.

A doctorate in food science comes with more than just a fancy title and framed certificate. It represents thousands of hours immersed in the best education, labs, and methods in the world. It indicates a mind sculpted to make connections, up and down the scale.

But again, you’re not just paying for all the knowledge we bring to bear. You’re paying to access a portal to overcome any obstacle that can be pieced apart by science, from appearance and sensory analysis to molecular activity.

If you had the budget to hire a full-time food scientist with that level of training, you could expect to pay an easy six-figure salary plus benefits.

But don’t worry—a lot of food-science problems can be solved with just a few days of direct consulting, via experiment design and training your team to conduct the data collection.

How much does a food science consultant cost?

Every project is different, of course, in terms of time, materials, and expenses like lab fees.

If we want to get down to the core of the problem—which we do, right?—it’ll generally take at least a full day of investigation and research. Effective food science isn’t one of those two-hour turnaround magic shows.

We don’t waste any time, but we also don’t cut corners. Food science is a systematic approach to problem solving. There’s investigation and research, experiment design and data collection, analysis and recommendations.

Experiments can take a few days to set up. If we need to collect data, we’ll train your team to do it to keep expenses minimal if possible, but training will take another day or so, and then there is analysis and reporting.

If you’re in a rush, hoping for a silver-bullet solution done cheap, quick, and dirty—then we’re simply not the right choice for the job.

But if you’re on a mission to bore into the very building blocks of whatever obstacle you’re facing—and rearrange it into a stairway to lasting success—then we’d love to hear what you’re working on. Tell us here.