Ultrasonic topic: "How to produce natural flavours from botanicals"

Flavour is the most important characteristic of food and beverages. Flavour is the combined experience of taste and aroma.
So what is taste? Taste refers to the senses that are experienced inside the mouth including the tongue.
And what is aroma? Aroma is the experience that is perceived inside the noses specifically related to the sense of smell.

In order to create flavourful foods and beverages, it is essential that the flavour components of the ingredients are released and presented in a delicious composition. This can be done during cooking, when the raw ingredients of a dish are prepared under the most beneficial conditions (e.g. heat, maceration, combination of food ingredients) as well as by adding spices and herbs, which are strong flavour carriers.
In industrial food production, flavour additives (e.g. flavour extracts or essential oils) are used to compose a unique taste and aroma profile.

Ultrasonic extraction is an innovative technique to produce natural flavours from botanicals. Ultrasonic cavitation breaks the cell matrix in botanicals, so that the entrapped flavour molecules are released. Ultrasonic extraction is widely used to isolate essential oils (e.g. from lavender, rose, bergamot, orange, anis, menthe or rosemary) as well as other flavour compounds (including volatiles such as terpenes, alcohols, aldehydes, esters, ketones, furanones).

Being a non-thermal extraction method, ultrasonic extraction prevents the thermal degradation of heat-sensitive compounds and protects the flavour as well as the nutritional value of the bioactive compounds. Further advantages of ultrasonic extractors are the more complete extract yield, the rapid processing, and the safe operation. Ultrasonic extraction is compatible with most solvents and sonication often allows for the use of milder, non-toxic solvents (such as water, alcohol, ethanol, glycerine, vegetable oils etc.).
Hielscher Ultrasonics is long-experienced in the development of ultrasonic extraction equipment for industrial use. Ultrasonic extractors can be used as stand-alone extraction technique or can be combined with other extraction methods such as hydrodistillation or infusion.

Read more about the benefits of ultrasonic extraction of flavour compounds!