CarobWay to introduce carob-derived low-glycemic sweetener: IFT FIRST 2023 Preview

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Foodtech startup Carob Way Ltd. (Rehovot, Israel) will introduce its low-glycemic sweetener made from whole carob fruit at the 2023 IFT FIRST Food Expo taking place in Chicago on July 16-19, 2023. The company will feature the ingredient in gummy and energy bar product samples at booth #S3471Q.

“Our natural sugar replacer provides a holistic solution based on all the goodness found in carob. You can plug it easily into almost any food and beverage application,” said Udi Alroy, CarobWay’s CEO and cofounder, in a press release. He added that while many carob sweeteners can have traces of bitter notes, CarobWay’s sweetener does not because the company chose varieties of carob tree that yield fruits with “a mild, pleasing caramel flavor.”

CarobWay’s ingredient is said to have a unique composition that includes “various sugars, plus the polyol D-pinitol, as well as trace soluble fibers and polyphenols.” The firm says that D-pinitol, which is naturally found in carob fruit, has a sweetness that is 50% that of sucrose. The company points to research it says showed that D-pinitol may help lower blood glucose levels, plus offer other health benefits. The company itself performed a bioavailability study on its ingredient using the SHIME in vitro model that showed that the D-pinitol in its ingredient is “highly bioavailable, while the other carob sugars are absorbed slowly,” the press release states.