Food-tech start-up B.T. Sweet Ltd introduces CAMBYA™ – its plant-based, sweetening platform to cut loads of sugar from favourite treats, such as hazelnut and chocolate spreads – in a breakthrough that could prove particularly beneficial in reducing children’s sugar consumption. 

B.T. Sweet has cracked the code in helping manufacturers create tasty hazelnut and chocolate spreads with less sugar. The company game-changing innovation offers leading sweet spread, filling, and coating companies’ new abilities to meet their sugar-reduction targets without compromising on much loved flavour qualities (especially those imposed by new regulations).

According to the UK’s National Health Service, while it is recommended that adults have no more than 30g of free sugars daily, children aged 7–10 years old should have no more than 24g per day. And children aged 4–6 should should be consuming no more than 19g of free sugars in a day.

Enter CAMBYA – a plant-based, one-to-one drop-in sugar replacer for use in multiple food applications. The proprietary formula, based on soluble fibres, monk fruit and select botanicals, is a 1:1 equivalent to sugar both in function and flavour, while acting as a source of naturally derived beneficial fibres. CAMBYA delivers optimal sweetening capacity, without the need for masking agents. It is ideal for lowering sugar levels in confectionary, cereals and ice cream. Most importantly, it does not leave any lingering aftertastes.

A tasty (and healthy) solution for an irresistable treat

“For many, a breakfast or school sandwich is incomplete without chocolate hazelnut spread,” observed Yoav Gaon, CEO of B.T. Sweet. “Parents struggle with their kids’ demands for it and have a hard time resisting it themselves. We succeeded in developing a tasty solution that kids of all ages love simply by switching white sugar with CAMBYA.”

Shockingly, sweet spreads typically contain up to 50 per cent sucrose. 

The start-up’s food technology team and chief confectioner tested the sweetening platform in several spread formulations with the goal of creating low sugar spread applications that cut the sugar load by at least 50 per cent, according to clients’ requests. The challenge was to perfectly mimic the flavour, colour and texture of a traditional category leading sweet spread, without any change to the mass of the product. In addition to extensive sensory lab testing across all parameters, the start-up trialled the products among children and their parents.

Kids are the primary market for chocolate spreads, birthday cakes, cookies filled with cream, and similar products,” explained Dagi Pekatch, Founder and Chairman of B.T Sweet. “We received excellent feedback from them. They loved the taste of our CAMBYA sweetened hazelnut and chocolate spreads – and we all know kids are hard to fool,” he quipped.

‘Plug and play’ sweetening platform

Since CAMBYA is one-to-one equivalent to sugar in taste, body and texture, there is no need for additives to keep the same weight of the product. A low-sugar spread with CAMBYA offers a rich, chocolatey, nutty taste with a creamy sensation, without adding any colours, preservatives, or added flavourings. Moreover, as an added advantage it is enriched in fibre and is also low in calories.

CAMBYA’s ‘plug and play’ sweetening platform allows food companies to reformulate their spreads, as well as other products with less white sugar. Manufacturers have the flexibility to completely switch to BT Sweet’s natural sweetening system, or balance it with sugar and other sweeteners according to desired levels without any adjustment to the recipe, thus saving R&D time and money. 

B.T. Sweet was founded in 2019 by serial industrial entrepreneur Dagi Pekatch, who was showing early signs of developing type 2 diabetes. After studying the negative health impacts of high sugar consumption, Pekatch approached colleagues Gilles Gamon, a veteran in the sugar reduction industry, and, food technology experts Yoel Benesh, Gil de-Picciotto, and Gitay Gryger, PhD. The team recruited Yoav Gaon, a retail and food industry expert as CEO and developed the game-changing, palate-gratifying, botanical sugar substitute CAMBYA™. The company has raised seed venture funding helping further its plans to develop sugar reduced proof of concepts for food and beverage companies, and the firm currently operates a production plant in Europe.