The term “flavour” has several meanings in everyday language. In most cases, it refers to the taste and odour of a food or meal – generally with positive connotations, that is, in an appetising manner. For instance, with coffee, one often talks of a “full-bodied” flavour; with barbecuing and roasting, they are known as tasty roasting flavours and with smoking – the oldest method for conserving food – these are smoke flavours.

In the case of fancy, high-quality ingredients or dishes, flavours define the associated “profile” of the product. For instance, a selected red wine may be described as having flavour attributes such as wild berry, chocolate and cloves.

What is the difference between spices and flavours?

The word “flavour” is of Greek origin and simply means “spice” or “odour”. The characteristic odour and taste of every spice – as well as of every fruit, nut, blossom, etc. – is produced naturally by the inherent flavouring substances.

In principle, Pure Flavour food flavourings are similar to conventional spices in terms of how they work and how they are used. The main difference is that our flavourings are many times more concentrated. In nature, flavours only occur in minuscule amounts in their carriers. For instance, all flavouring substances in an apple account for one thousandth of its total weight at most. Nonetheless, this minuscule component plays a key role in our perception of the taste. Pure Flavour flavourings are based on this model. In our flavourings, the flavouring substances of natural foods are prepared in such a concentration that only a few drops are enough to give food an intense flavour.

For this reason, Pure Flavour flavourings are also suitable for direct consumption. But generally they are intended to be used as flavouring and flavour-enhancing components in dishes, beverages and foods. Even with a surprisingly small quantity of flavouring, you can give your culinary creations new, exciting flavours.

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Do more in the kitchen

With Pure Flavour flavourings, you can get creative in the kitchen and experiment to your heart’s desire: Easily add an exotically nutty, savoury or fruity touch to your dishes – whatever suits your fancy.

You can use our flavourings to enhance or modify the taste of your ingredients and meals or take them in an entirely new direction. Flavourings add an entirely new range of tastes to your everyday culinary life.

What are the flavourings made of?

Most flavourings consist of a mixture of numerous individual flavouring substances, whereby a flavouring substance always describes a precisely defined fragrance. For instance, the typical strawberry fragrance is the product of a composition consisting of 200 flavouring substances, which, acting in concert, define the authentic taste of strawberry flavouring. More than 10,000 different flavouring substances have been identified to date in nature!

With a small number of flavours, the authentic character is not defined by the interaction of numerous, but only a single flavouring substance. As a result, with vanilla, the pure flavouring substance vanillin is enough to replicate the sensory impression of the spice.

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Coffee – a genuine flavour explosion

There is a good reason why preparing Italy’s number one beverage has become a science of its own. After all, coffee has one of the most complex flavour profiles of all.

The pure coffee bean alone already contains several hundred flavour substances. Through the roasting process, the taste becomes even more intense and is completed by new roasting flavours. For instance, more than 1,000 different flavouring substances can interact in a single cup of coffee!

How do you acquire flavourings?

A flavouring substance can be acquired, among other things, from a flavouring extract. Flavouring extracts are aqueous or alcoholic extracts from plant components that contain multiple individual flavouring compounds – flavouring substances. With the help of distillation, flavouring extracts are broken down to their individual components in order to obtain specific flavouring substances.

Generally, a single flavouring extract serves as a basis for the manufacture of a Pure Flavour flavouring.

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What do flavourings look like?

In an unbonded form, flavouring substances are highly volatile. On one hand, this gives them the advantage of being able to unleash their full effect when smelled. On the other hand, this feature also makes handling the flavourings a challenge. They cannot be used in their pure form as they would immediately dissipate and get lost.

In order to maintain their potential for providing flavour and odour over as long a timeframe as possible, flavourings are therefore dissolved in a so-called carrier. This may be, for example, alcohol (ethanol), water or propylenglycol. The carrier fixes the flavouring so that its sensory effect is not unleashed before the desired usage. At the same time, the pure flavouring is diluted in this way so that it can be dosed better.

Flavourings only change the flavour profile of food in which they are used, not the food itself. Even the carriers are selected such that they are suitable for consumption. For this reason, you can use Pure Flavour flavourings as a food ingredient without any concern.

What is what?

Flavourings are products that are added to food in order to give it a unique flavour and/or odour. At the same time, flavourings may be made of flavouring substances, flavouring extracts, process flavourings, smoke flavourings and other categories of flavourings.

Flavouring substances

Flavourings are chemically defined substances with flavouring properties. So far, around 10,000 flavouring substances could be identified. 2,500 thereof are used in the European food industry. The past differentiation in terms of natural, synthetic and artificial flavouring substances is no longer valid according to the European regulation from 2018. Artificial flavors do not occur naturally in foods and are therefore synthesized in the laboratory. They count as additives subject to approval in Germany and are only used in exceptional cases. As before, special requirements apply when using the term “natural” in connection with flavouring substances (see below).

Natural flavourings

With natural flavourings, though the flavouring substances are made of a natural raw material of plant, animal or microbiological origin, they do not necessarily come from the designated food. For instance, one can obtain the characteristic flavouring substance vanillin, which is characteristic for vanilla, from rice bran. Only when one uses the term natural vanilla flavour, is this subject to the requirement that at least 95 per cent of the flavouring comes from the raw material from which it has its name.

Nature-identical flavourings

These are flavouring substances that are synthetically manufactured and chemically identical to a natural flavouring substance. The most well known example is Vanillin.

Flavouring extracts

Extraction simply means to “draw out”. In this case, flavouring substances are acquired from the original ingredient such as spices, herbs, meat, fish, fruits and vegetables. Therefore, the flavouring extract is an extract from the original ingredient in a solvent such as alcohol or oil.

Process flavourings

These flavourings can be obtained through the controlled heating of various ingredients. For instance, roasting flavourings are created when baking bread and roasting meat. The key source compounds in this process are nitrogen (protein elements) and reducing sugars (e.g., glucose).

Smoke flavourings

In order for a smoke flavouring to be created, smoke must be condensed in water. This only means that the smoke is collected in the water. Nothing else happens during the smoking process. Smoke flavourings are particularly popular when it comes to giving snacks, sauces or soups a smoky flavour.

Carrier

Given that flavourings are volatile, a flavour carrier is needed to fix the flavouring and odour long term until it reaches the application location. Furthermore, the flavour carrier serves to dilute the intense flavouring so that it can be dosed. Flavour carriers include, among other things, ethanol, water and propylenglycol.