Apr 1, 2024

Imagine: Discovering an innovative way to eliminate nitrate from cured meat.

Brenntag finds a solution to avoid the addition of nitrites and nitrates in cured meat

As pressure builds to remove nitrites and nitrates from cured meat products, Brenntag Food & Nutrition has conceived a breakthrough solution. By activating a natural pathway in the meat, consumer-friendly CARNIFLORA®provides pink colour stabilisation without the addition of nitrites or nitrates.

For decades, the use of nitrites (E249 and E250) and nitrates (E251 and E252) has been common practice in cured meats. Not only do these additives act as preservatives and ensure the microbiological safety of these foods, they also give them their characteristic taste and appealing colour.

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Regulatory reform

Although nitrites and nitrates are very effective additives, their presence in food has been shown to give rise to the formation of nitrosamines, some of which are carcinogenic. This has led to the EU tightening its rules on the use of nitrites and nitrates as additives. The amendment of Regulation 1333/2008 on food additives has revised down the maximum levels for the use of nitrites and nitrates in cured meat products to 80 mg/kg of product. The stricter limits come into effect on 9th October 2025.

Whilst the new lower regulatory thresholds do not outlaw the use of nitrites and nitrates altogether, in practice, it is the market that calls the shots. Label-savvy, health-conscious consumers are making it clear they don’t want to see these additives on supermarket shelves. This is compounding pressure on manufacturers to move away from nitrites and nitrates completely.

Stéphanie Pretesacque, Director of Innovation & Applications Food & Nutrition at Brenntag Food & Nutrition EMEA, gives her view on how the industry will react to the changes:

“The new lower regulatory thresholds will create strong pressure on the food industry to reformulate products containing nitrites and nitrates and validate the performance in the new recipes. It is likely that the meat industry, especially, will take this opportunity to remove these additives completely from their recipes and use new alternative technologies that will also meet the demand from consumers for cleaner labels and more natural products.”

slices of salami on a wood board as a background

What consumers want

Nadia D’Incecco, EMEA Strategic Marketing Director Nutrition, explains how changing consumer attitudes are coming into play here, steering the industry away from additives and towards clean labels in the name of healthy eating.

“There is a growing perception among consumers that eating well is closely connected to clean and clear labels. Consumers want to see shorter, cleaner ingredient lists, and that means fewer additives and E-numbers. There is definitely no place for nitrites or nitrates on these labels,” she says.

Consumers don’t want to see chemicals on labels, but nor do they want deli products that are brown or grey in colour and lacking in flavour. They want the characteristic pink hue and savoury taste they are accustomed to from cured meats, which is why eliminating nitrites and nitrates is no mean feat, as Stéphanie explains: “Producing cured meats without using nitrites and nitrates represents a major food technology challenge as they are multi-functional components that play a key role in preserving and stabilising the product as well as conferring organoleptic properties.”

Current options

As this is not a new challenge, there have already been some attempts at substitution, with nitrate- and nitrite-enriched plant extracts based on spinach and celery, colouring foods, red fermented rice powder from monascus purpureus, and spices and blends with paprika, red beet, burnt sugar, etc. However, none of these represented an ideal solution - all had certain drawbacks which meant they fell short of legislator, manufacturer or consumer demands.

“Enriched plant extracts still contain sources of nitrites and/or nitrates and do not solve the problem as such, whilst some other solutions use ‘hidden’ technologies which do not meet the consumer’s expectation of transparency. What manufacturers really need are solutions that deliver the taste and colour of a cured meat without using additional flavourings or colourings,” says Dina Kulke, Regulatory Affairs Manager, Brenntag Food & Nutrition EMEA.

Ahead of the curve

Anticipating changes in the regulatory landscape and sensing growing anti-additive sentiment in the market, more than six years ago, Brenntag Food & Nutrition started working on its own solution to this challenge.

“At that time, in our team we had a talented junior food technologist who was passionate about meat technology and came up with the idea of stabilising the meat using a natural pathway,” recalls Stéphanie.

The idea was shared with Brenntag’s Innovation and Application Centre in Italy, a centre of expertise for meat technology. It soon became a pan-European project, with teams from Poland and Italy collaborating to fine-tune and validate the solution through trials on multiple meat products. Customer engagement and consultation at every stage of the development process ensured it delivered in terms of commercial viability, performance and reliability.

A natural pathway to colour stabilisation and flavour formation

Marketed under the CARNIFLORA® label, this innovative solution is based on a fermentation process that results in an optimised combination of components that are naturally present in meat.

“The action of a carefully selected and specific food culture combined with optimized product recipes and manufacturing processes results in the formation of a stable pink meat pigment. As well as stabilising the colour, CARNIFLORA® maintains the taste and texture of the cured meat,” explains Stéphanie.

The technology is tailored to provide application-specific solutions for a range of meat and deli products, including cold cuts, cooked ham, frankfurter sausages, mortadella, Italian salami, kabanossi, bacon and processed poultry products.

For example, to produce frankfurter sausages that are free from added nitrites, Brenntag recommends CARNIFLORA® FOOD CULTURE NF in conjunction with CARNIFLORA® MIX NFB and CARNIFLORA® FLAVOR NF.

Clean and clear label

The CARNIFLORA® suite is entirely clean and clear label; it uses no artificial colours, colouring foodstuffs, fermented plant extracts or allergenic ingredients and enables the on-pack claims: ‘without added preservatives nitrates/nitrites’ and ‘without added sources of nitrates/nitrites’. It can be declared on-pack as ‘natural flavouring’, whilst the food culture should be labelled in accordance with national legislation.

“We are very excited to have developed a clean label solution that enables nitrates or nitrites to be removed from deli meats without any compromise on the appearance, texture or taste of the product. Our dedicated team of specialists is looking forward to working closely with manufacturers to validate the technology for their individual processes,” says Stéphanie.