The vegan trend may have started off small, but it’s a force to be reckoned with these days. For bakers, it means replacing key functional ingredients. However, it’s also an opportunity for innovation and powerful solutions. So what do you need to know about it?
Our first guest to weigh in is Mark Floerke, the community and forum manager with BAKERpedia. Trained as a pastry chef and confectioner in Germany, Mark is a seasoned baker who has recently retired after 25 years with ADM. He shares with Dr. Lin how he has seen the vegan trend evolve over the years and the driving factors behind it. A few topics they discuss are:
- How to design a food product for the vegan trend
- The key functional ingredients to replace
- Innovative solutions that work well
- Why egg replacement is a big deal in this story
- Why the vegan trend is driving innovation and new products
Protein for the vegan trend
Speaking of innovation, our next guest is Tyler Lorenzen, CEO of PURIS. Tyler grew up helping his father pollinate peas. Now, that family company is positioned right in the middle of the booming plant based trend. PURIS sells ingredients derived from peas: starches, fibers, protein and more.
What’s unique about their story is their origins. Tyler shares how long before the plant protein, sustainable-food trend, his father made non-GMO seeds specially bred to grow high-yield, disease-resistant crops during the 1980s with the goal of finding a way of getting protein to the world. 20 years later, they have 400 farmers growing peas from California to Georgia and almost everywhere in between as a sustainable double crop system. Tyler and Dr. Lin talk about the company’s journey over the years and where it’s headed now.
Want to talk about vegan baking, or other big trends? Join the BAKERforum to find solutions and ask questions.
