Fiberstar’s global innovation contest provides University students around the world an opportunity to create new uses for Citri-Fi 125, a natural citrus fiber used in the food and beverage industry for high water holding capacity and natural emulsification properties.
RIVER FALLS, WISCONSIN (PRWEB) MARCH 14, 2018
Fiberstar, Inc. a global market leader in clean label food ingredient solutions for the food and beverage industry announced the winners to the 2nd Citri-Fi 125 Student Innovation Contest. Citri-Fi 125, a natural, non-GMO citrus fiber is one of the most recent additions to the Citri-Fi portfolio. To find new uses for this natural citrus fiber, Fiberstar launched a global innovation contest targeting University students. This contest focused not only on food applications, but also industrial applications as well. Over 50 applicants, globally, submitted a proposal in how to use the Citri-Fi 125.
“We are pleased that the program’s submission rate doubled this year. Many talented students globally created novel and innovative uses for this natural ingredient.” says Fiberstar, Inc. President and CEO, John Haen. “We will continue to support University food & industrial science programs by offering students opportunities to create natural ingredient solutions for the real world.”
A panel of judges ranked the students’ applications based on originality of concept, justification/market need, ingredient commercial feasibility, technical feasibility and quality of their report. A total of $30,000 was awarded to the six winning proposals in addition to the $5,000 presented to the top industrial application. The following winning teams and applications are:
1st Place: Citri-Fi 125 to improve hummus. Kansas State University (Yuda Ou, Yizhou Ben Ma, Jingwen Xu) Citri-Fi 125 enhances texture, reduces syneresis and increases profitability of hummus.
2nd Place: Nashville-style hot chicken sauce. Ohio State University (Elliot Dhuey, Yuko Nishikawa, Amanda Sia, Megan Kesler, Rachel Chen) Citrus fiber functionalities enhance flavor and rheological properties to improve cling and spice usage in sauces.
3rd Place: C-Nut Butter. University of Massachusetts-Amherst (Weipeng Qi , Jinning Liu, Yuejia Xu, Yiren Yue, Yanqi Qu, Ye Peng) A homemade peanut butter with high dietary fiber and low-fat content.
4th Place: Novel application of Citri-Fi 125FG to enhance shelf life of fresh meat. University of Wisconsin, Stout (Paige Elfering, Reddy Medagam, Sarah Keute, Erica Zalk, Emily Lehmann, Jozie MaClelland, Srikanth RR, Arpit Jain)
5th Place: Citri-Fi 125 is used as a natural coating to yield health improvement in French fries. Wageningen University (Miss Panitnart Kanjanatiwat, Miss Chunyi Yan, Mr. Gérault-Landry Aubry Baudouin Gauvin Nazaire Jonathan Maximilien Eggermont, Mr. Onkar Pratik) Citri-Fi 125 helps to reduce acrylamide level in French fries.
6th Place: Development of a novel whey cheese enriched with citrus fiber using the market name “Oran-Cheese”. Aristotle University of Thessaloniki (Athanasios Nikolaidis, Thomas Moschakis, Prodromos Prodomidis, Marios Andreadis)
1st Place for Industrial Application: Use of Citri-Fi Fiber as thickener to replace carboxymethyl cellulose in paper coatings. North Carolina State University (Preeti Tyagi, Michael Joyce). The citrus fiber improves quality and provides potential cost savings.
Fiberstar also offers other citrus fiber solutions via the 100 series line which contains different fiber content than the 125 series, the 200 series which is citrus fiber and guar gum and the 300 series which is the citrus fiber and xanthan gum. The Citri-Fi citrus fiber product lines provide food manufacturers clean label texturizing solutions for various food products including bakery, beverages, dressings, meats, sauces and dairy.
“Being a leader in the natural products market, we are excited to add new innovative solutions to our portfolio of applications. Our team will continue working closely with our Customers to provide superior technical service support, quality product and new ideas especially those generated from the most recent innovation contest. And we look forward to connecting with Universities and students in the future to continue the collaboration.”
For more information about the Innovation Contest applications, please contact Dr. Brock Lundberg at (651) 271-0328
