Garlic Oil

Garlic Oil
The essential oil of garlic can be recovered by steam distillation of the freshly crushed cloves, the yielding being 0.1 to 0.2%.

Garlic oil is a powerful flavoring agent and is widely used in seasonings either as a liquid flavor or dispersed as a dry-carrier.

Many problems arise when fresh garlic is included in a food product.

The commercially-available vegetable occurs as a compound bulb made up of 10 to 14 small “cloves” encased in a tough outer skin.

The bulb must first be cleaned and sorted, the outer tissues removed and the cloves separated. The garlic is then ready for mincing, cutting or crushing.

The whole process is tedious and the manufacturing department becomes permeated with the smell.

This can give rise to the problem of cross-contamination unless great care is taken.

Like all other natural products, the flavoring effect of fresh garlic is variable whereas that of garlic oil is relatively consistent.

It is not surprising, therefore, that garlic oil is now widely used in place of the fresh vegetable.

To overcome the objectionable odor associated with both fresh garlic and garlic oil, the use of an encapsulated garlic oil is strongly recommended.

This dry powder is almost free of odor and does not release its contents until the capsule is broken down by admixture with water.
Garlic Oil

Dehydrated Onion

Dehydrated Onion
The domestic onion is one of the world’s oldest crops. The many advances in the formulation and manufacture of dehydrated meals have created a demand for onion in a powder form and considerable tonnages are now dehydrated annually to satisfy this need.

There is some loss in the fresh odor and flavor character during the processing but, in spite of this, the dehydrated form has the advantage that it saves valuable preparation time on the factory floor, there is little or no waste or spoilage and, within acceptable limits, it gives a consistent flavor to the end product.

The nature of this flavor is different from that of fresh onions so that a direct equivalence cannot be established. However, allowance is made for this during product formulation and an acceptable usage level established by trial and error. For guidance, initial usage levels assume an 8:1 fortification of the flavor in the dehydrated form and the missing top-notes may be added in the form of a liquid flavor made from onion oil.

Onions grown for dehydration are not generally the same as those used domestically. The prime consideration is, of course, that of high dry solids content with a good level of flavor and pungency.

Although care is taken during all stages of manufacture, onion powder is still hygienically suspect, and unless special handling techniques are adopted the product may show very high total bacterial and spore counts. However, these counts are of far less significance to the food processor than is presence of pathogens and Salmonella which clearly indicates faulty processing. Most specification for onion powder define limit for total count but this is relatively meaningless. Of far greater significance is a limit of Coliform organisms and a requirement that pathogens and Salmonella be completely absent.
Dehydrated Onion