Dairy Flavoring Company Aims to Perfect Vegan Cheese

Longtime dairy flavoring company Edlong Dairy Technologies is invoking the indulgent flavor of dairy cheese but without the use of animal products to tap into a growing demand for both allergen-free and cruelty-free foods.“We started by adding in a [vegan] butter flavor to build some buttery richness and to mask some of the starch and mask the vegetable fat,” Edlong Europe’s applications manager Anne-Marie Butler said of the process toward creating new flavors using vegan bases. “We added in cheddar-type flavors in there to build savoriness and background cheesy notes.” The company has already developed vegan parmesan and is currently working on vegan cheddar, flavors the manufacturer hopes to be applied in the production of new dairy-free, cheesy-flavored snacks and vegan food products—a category that, according to Butler, has grown by 257 percent in the last five years. German ingredient developer Hydrosol is on a similar mission to perfect vegan meat substitutes. Last month, the company debuted HydroTop High Gel, a vegan stabilizing system that helps plant-based meat companies achieve a “meatier” texture in its products.