Modifying flavor in dairy foods
Vanilla. Chocolate. Strawberry. Consumers expect these three familiar flavors of milk, ice cream and some cultured dairy foods to taste a certain way, as they do most standard flavors of food. Consumers have a preconceived notion of taste and when a product does not deliver against the description, it’s often rejected, permanently.
“Many masking agents are designed to target receptors on the tongue,” said Darrel Terry, master flavors-beverages, Sensient Flavors, Hoffman Estates, Ill. “They fill in the pockets of the receptor, preventing the undesirable flavor molecules from being detected. With our masking agents, we can achieve 60% to 95% blockages of the undesired notes.”