As always, the Belgian food production industry was in high profile during the SIAL fair. The geographically small country packed a big punch at this year’s October 15-19 running of the trade show, ranking third in the number of exhibitors behind Italy and France, and ahead of Spain and Turkey out of 124 nations represented.
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Among key processors and marketers from Belgium’s robust frozen vegetable and fruit sector showing their stuff at the bustling Parc des Espositions Paris Nord Villepinte venue were Ardo, Crop’s, Greenyard and HerbaFrost.
The busy booth of Ooigem-headquartered Crop’s showcased the family-owned and operated company’s extensive assortment of vegetables and ready meals, as well as whole fruit and portions including halves, quarters, slices, chunks and cubes.
Also in the spotlight were purees and smoothies including Strawberry Delight, Raspberry Heaven, Mango Dream, Pineapple Sunset and many other flavors that proved to be very popular among show-goers. Pieter Delbaere and Kirsten Nijsten, respectively general manager and marketing manager of Crop’s Fruits NV, saw to it that thirsty visitors from the FrozenFoodsBiz.com team were slaked to satisfaction.
Raw material inputs for Crop’s extensive range of value-added fruit products are sourced around the world – from fertile fields and orchards in Serbia, Poland, Morocco, Costa Rica, Chile and beyond. The company operates four fruit production and freezing facilities, all located within the immediate areas of harvest.
Apart from fruit, an abundance of frozen vegetable and ready meal products were available to see and sample at SIAL. Crop’s, which is a long-established brand name known to Belgian consumers since the late s and early ’50s, today has five vegetable processing plants in as many countries – Belgium, France, Portugal, Spain and Poland. Its customer base includes buyers from retail, wholesale and foodservice sectors, as well as industrial further processors.
Team Ardo was in fine form at the Paris show, where its Beetroot Burger and Tricolore Lentis Mix were nominated for SIAL Innovation Awards. But much excitement at the Ardooie-headquartered frozen vegetable and fruit company’s stand stemmed from recently introduced Chunky Sautéed Carrots and Trio Crispy Vegetable Fingers, both colorful additions to its growing range of plant-based products.
Trio Crispy Vegetable Fingers are presented as a “must-have in your kitchen.” Golden Sweetcorn fingers, Orange Vegetable Fingers with carrot, butternut and sweet potato, and Broccoli Fingers in a surprising and attractive red crust may be served separately or together. The combination of yellow, orange and red hues immediately adds color to tapas plates, side dishes or main courses. Each can be served as alternatives to fries, as salad toppings or in a wrap.
Chunky Sautéed Carrots are a colorful mix of yellow, orange and purple carrots sautéed in vegetable oil. Sautéing gives them a distinctly full-bodied carrot flavor with a deliciously al dente texture. The unique hand-cut look also makes this mix a “must-have” in any kitchen, says Ardo.
The carrots have not been seasoned, so they may be combined with a whole range of other flavors such as onions and parsley and ginger as well as Ardo’s Provence herb mix and so much more. This just goes to show once again that convenience and great taste go hand in hand.
Nadja Meulemans, export sales manager in the Greenyard Group’s frozen division, updated FrozenFoodsBiz.com about the Westrozebeke-based unit’s chef-created plant-based food offerings and long-term plans for a plant-powered future.
In fact, plant-based food products are really nothing new at Greenyard as the company’s Pinguin brand of frozen vegetables and fruits has been an innovator in the field since the label debuted in West Flanders by the entrepreneurial Dejonghe brothers back in . All of Pinguin products were then, and are now, plant-based in the purest form as in actuality all plants are vegetables.
Greenyard Frozen’s wide range of value-added convenience products run the gamut from traditional vegetable mixes and purees to soups, herbs, cauliflower rice and couscous, pastas, risottos smoothies and ready meals distributed to retail, foodservice and B2B channels worldwide.
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The company, which ranks as the No. 2 producer of frozen vegetable and fruits in Europe and exports to more than 80 countries, operates a network of highly efficient production plants equipped with specialized coating lines in Belgium, France, the United Kingdom and Poland.
Those who stopped by Hulshout-based frozen herbs specialist HerbaFrost’s stand had to be impressed with the company’s fiber-free frozen puree Herb Drops. The 100% natural basil, dill, chervil, coriander, rocket, mint, garden cress and parsley curried assortment is available in 5- and 20-gram portions.
The convenient product is ready to use at any time, as there is no need for defrosting. Consumers at home can just add a quickly dissolving drop to main course meals and side dishes as well as soups, sauces, cocktails, sorbets and smoothies to create a “flavor explosion.”
In business for more than 20 years, HerbaFrost’s free-flowing, IQF frozen herbs, drops and pellets are offered in organic as well as conventional form to industrial further processors as well as foodservice operators and retail buyers.
In addition to Hulshout, Herbafrost also sources and processes Belgian-grown herbs from fields in the Diksmuide-Vladslo area. These two locations, with different soil characteristics, allow the company to spread risk and guarantee high quality at all times.
According to the show organizer, more than 265,000 visitors from over 200 countries attended the event. Approximately 8,000 top buyers with upwards of €50 billion in purchasing power were on the scene, checking out in excess of 400,000 products on display across 250,000 square meters of floor space. The next edition of the biennial exhibition is set for October 19-23, .
Technology has come a long way when it comes to keeping fruit and vegetables fresh for an extended period of time. Extending the shelf life does not always mean extending the taste, however. This is where IQF Freezing can be a solution, according to Svetlana Plotean of OctoFrost.
There are multiple advantages when comparing IQF (Individual Quick) Freezing to either other freezing methods or other ways of processing foods. According to Svetlana Plotean, marketing manager for OctoFrost, one of the three main advantages would be keeping the nutritional value intact: “Especially when exporting fruit and vegetables overseas, sometimes it can take up to three weeks for the product to reach its destination. This means the product has lost a significant amount of the nutritional value along with the taste and flavor. This is why our clients are using our equipment to freeze the produce at its source, at peak ripeness when it’s nutritional value is at its maximum. The factory would ideally be right next to the fields for optimal efficiency.”
Another advantage of using IQF Freezing would be the convenience of being able to defrost the exact amount of fruit or veg you need for your meal, smoothie or even snack: “There’s no need to defrost the entire bag while not planning to use all of it. This ties in directly with a third advantage: decreasing waste. We waste about 40 to 70% of our fresh food, depending on the product. When it comes to being environmentally aware and not wasting food, IQF Freezing is unbeatable,” Plotean explains. “This means it’s a win-win for both consumers and businesses alike, for consumers the decrease in wasted food even leads to saving money. Because of the climate change and our responsibility to take care of our planet, it is vital we reduce food waste. I expect IQF Freezing will become the standard when supplying produce overseas.”
The technology used for IQF Freezing appeared about twenty years ago, so it’s still relatively new. Over time improvements have been made according to Plotean: “With technology changing so fast, we have been able to improve a lot of aspects of the freezing process. For one we’ve been able to make the entire process much more energy efficient, which helps in both keeping the costs down, while also keeping the environmental aspect in mind. We’ve also been able to make the process more flexible in terms of switching between various products. For instance, in the traditional freezers cleaning a belt for changing products is a a long and disruptive process. OctoFrost, on the other hand, has developed easily exchangeable bedplates which can be changed with a new, clean set in about 2 min. This brings a lot of flexibility to processors.”
OctoFrost has developed unique aerodynamics in its freezer which minimizes dehydration of the product and optimizes energy efficiency. This has been done by combining a very compact body freezer design with adjustable speed of fans. The product quality is significantly increased by these technologies. Another example of our innovativeness is the way we transfer heat in the IF blancher, IF cooker and IF chiller. Where other equipment would use steam to transfer the heat, our food processing machinery uses rain shower system instead. The result is better temperature control and faster heat transfer, our method is simply more efficient,” Plotean says.
As for the future, technology never stands still. Plotean expects there is still a lot of ground to be won when it comes to the sizing of IQF Freezing equipment: “Sizing goes hand in hand with efficiency and this has always been one of our main goals. Already our equipment is about 30 to 40% smaller than the freezing and processing equipment of our competitors, which not only saves energy but also makes space usage more efficient. You can imagine a client would not want to take apart half of his factory floor, simply to replace or improve on a single component of a IQF Freezing line. So we’ll always try to advance in terms of efficiency, and have already proven to be successful in this department. We’re also exploring different kinds of new applications that can be IQF frozen. We’re able to IQF freeze herbs and leafy products now for instance. This is a great solution for maintaining the fresh taste.”
All in all, Plotean believes that IQF Freezing should become the future of supplying fruit and veg: “I honestly think Fresh will not survive in the long term, when it comes to transporting overseas. Fresh transport will always be around, but I expect it to be for local supply. Customer expectations keep increasing, and they are looking for natural taste and flavor which is very difficult to find in fresh fruits and berries, for instance, which are supplied from overseas.”
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