What is CMC in Food

CMC in food has many functions, such as thickening, emulsifying, excipient, puffing and preservation. It can be used instead of gelatin, agar, sodium alginate and other food gums. The addition of CMC in food can reduce the cost of food production, improve food grade, and taste, and extend the shelf life. It is a food additive often used by food researchers. CMC has been widely used in various solid foods, liquid beverages, lactic acid beverages, canned foods, candies, cakes, meat products, biscuits, instant noodles, rolled noodles, instant boiled foods, quick-frozen snacks and soy milk, yoghurt, peanut milk, fruit tea, fruit juice and other foods.

1. Liquid drinks

The application of CMC in liquid beverages can make the suspension of CMC in the dissolver even and full, bright colour and eye-catching, and prolong the fresh-keeping period. Its usage is about 3-4 of the total amount of solids and aqueous solutions.

2. Lactic acid milk and acidic beverages

Acidic-resistant CMC can play a stabilizing role, with the characteristics of preventing precipitation and stratification, improving taste, improving quality, high-temperature resistance and so on. Good stability, not easy to precipitate; can extend the shelf life of products; strong acid resistance, PH value in the range of 2-4, can improve the taste of beverages, smooth entrance. The usage is about 4-5‰.

3. soymilk

CMC for food can suspend and emulsify soymilk stably. It can prevent fat from floating and sinking, and has a good effect on whitening, sweetening and removing bean smell of soymilk. The dosage was added in the proportion of 5‰ of the total amount.

4. ice cream

CMC powder used in ice cream has good formability and is not easy to break. It keeps ice crystals and has a slippery tongue touch. CMC for ice cream has good gloss and beauty. It has fewer ice crystals, anti-melting, delicate taste and lubrication, whitening colour and increasing original volume, so as to achieve the effect of improving quality and increasing benefit. The dosage was added in the proportion of 5‰ of the total amount.

5. Bread and pasta

The application of CMC in bread production can make the bread honeycomb uniform, increase its volume, reduce slagging and not collapse, and also has the function of heat preservation and freshness preservation. CMC used in instant noodles and rolled noodles can enhance the toughness of noodles, maintain length, boil resistance, and make the taste delicate and lubricated. At the same time, when stirring and calendering, it has strong stickiness and water retention and contains water, and it is easy to stir; after steam heating, it produces a film protective layer with a smooth and lustrous surface, which is easy to process; it consumes less oil in frying; it can improve the strength of the surface, and is not easy to break in packaging and handling; it has a good taste and boiling bubbles are not pasty. In addition, the application in instant noodle production can save medicinal oil, reduce costs and increase benefits. The dosage was added in the proportion of 5‰ of the total amount. It can be seen that CMC in food industry is widely used and has good market prospects.