The food inclusions market — split into chocolate chips and chunks, candy pieces, fruits and nuts, herbs, spices, and even savory ingredients like cheese or bacon bits — is thriving based on demand for value-added food products and significantly wider application in dairy products, ice cream, frozen desserts, confectionary, baked products, and snacks and bars.
In the dairy industry, inclusions commonly add color, taste, and texture to premium ice cream — think chunks of cookie dough, swirls of caramel, and slivers of nuts and cherries — and yogurt with its now popular “sidecar” packaging.
Ingredients, flavors, colors and toppings give consumers something to “scream about.” Not only will the ice cream category grow 37% over 2021, but consumers are loving the five most popular flavors: Chocolate, Cookies ‘N Cream, Vanilla, Strawberry and Chocolate Chip.
Sunny-tasting fruits and fibrous nuts exemplify health and flavor in dairy products, including.ice cream, cheese, milk and yogurt. Because of their healthy halo, nut products are projected to reach $8.9 billion by 2027, according to Research and Markets.
Inclusions — visible ingredients that add extra flavor, texture, and color into a food or beverage product — have been used to jazz up dairy offerings for years.