
Nestle says it will cut sugar in chocolate by 40% - throwaway-hn123
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-38167241
======
GordonS
What will they replace the reduced mass with, to bulk up the product so it
doesn't appear smaller?

My guess is it sure as hell won't be actual cocoa :/ [1]

[1]
[https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:9ihtAG...](https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:9ihtAGGkUggJ:https://www.ft.com/content/9e71ebe2-ab56-11e6-9cb3-bb8207902122+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=uk&client=firefox-b)

~~~
dingaling
My wife's standard approach to any cake or confectionary recipe is to
immediately half the listed quantity of sugar. Apparently this is common
amongst pastry-chefs in catering and doesn't appear to affect the final result
other than being a bit paler after cooking.

We even made half-sugar doughnuts recently which were still delicious ( no
topping or filling needed ).

So I reckon Nestle will just produce a slightly less bulky confectionery, for
the same price of course.

~~~
notalaser
Me and my girlfriend (we both really, really like cooking) do that with a lot
of recipes that involve sugar. It does affect the texture, but I think it
often improves the taste.

There are things that _ought_ to be sugary (like thick syrups used for
preserving), but most pastries, jams, jellies and deserts in general need
surprisingly less sugar than recent cookbooks would imply. Adding just enough
sugar to take the edge off of bitterness or sourness ends up being more
rewarding than cramming everything full of sugar to the point where all you
feel is something odd next to the sweetness.

~~~
gnopgnip
There are safety concerns when changing any recipe that will be preserved. The
sugar in jams and jellies also acts as a preservative after they are opened.

~~~
matt-attack
Curious how sugar is a preservative? I would have thought it was food for
bacteria.

~~~
gambiting
Honey is pretty much nothing but sugar yet absolutely no bacteria can grow in
it - there's basically a point where there's too much of it.

~~~
caf
Honey also contains a small amount of hydrogen peroxide.

------
momeara
Here is patent [1].

The key idea is to add a glucosyltransferase from Lactobacillus, which
consumes simple sugars and produces complex sugars.

It is not clear to me that this will be beneficial for human health.

[1]
[https://patentscope.wipo.int/search/en/detail.jsf;jsessionid...](https://patentscope.wipo.int/search/en/detail.jsf;jsessionid=71B661B463561D0C0F31EE2E222E7487.wapp1nC?docId=WO2016173929&recNum=10&maxRec=3456&office=&prevFilter=&sortOption=Pub+Date+Desc&queryString=nestec+sugar&tab=PCTDescription)

~~~
Drdrdrq
This! Sugar at least has known side effects. :-/

~~~
greenshackle2
> Lactobacillus

Chances are, you're already eating them in dairy.

It's not like we understand the 'side effects' of most things we eat. Any
plant or fruit or fermented product you eat is made up of thousands of
compounds, almost none of which have been tested for their effects in
isolation.

(But, you know, I'm pretty confident candy bars are _bad for you_. This change
will not make them any better.)

------
inDigiNeous
You should definitely boycott Nestle. They are for example aggressively
pushing baby milk replacements for newborns in developing countries: more info
here:[http://www.babymilkaction.org/nestlefree#evidence](http://www.babymilkaction.org/nestlefree#evidence)

"Nestlé promotes its baby milk around the world with the claim such as it is
the ‘natural start’, ‘gentle start’ and ‘protects’ babies. In truth, babies
fed on formula are more likely to become sick than breastfed babies and, in
conditions of poverty, more likely to die. Nestlé has promised to drop the
‘natural start’ claim by mid-2015 following pressure from the campaign, but
not the others."

Also, they have been calling for privatization and taking away water as a
basic human right, instead wanting to sell people water in bottles.

Here's a list of Nestle products to boycott:
[http://www.babymilkaction.org/nestle-boycott-
list](http://www.babymilkaction.org/nestle-boycott-list)

It contains some surprising ones, like San Pellegrino which is considered to
be a high quality water.

~~~
dexterdog
I can follow that list no problem except for nespresso. The quality bang for
the buck you get with those is so much better than the garbage that passes for
coffee in a k-cup.

~~~
semi-extrinsic
No, it's not. If you actually do the math, the Nespresso coffee pods are so
expensive per cup as compared to buying ground or whole espresso beans in
tins, that a Nespresso machine with pods vs a proper Rancilio Silvia with Illy
espresso breaks even in a little more than 12 months. Even though the Rancilio
is $650+.

Also, the Nespresso pods are pretty bad on the environment, since they're made
from aluminium (energy intensive process) but can't be recycled since they're
full of spent coffee.

~~~
dexterdog
Most of what I'm paying for is the convenience. I have a machine in my office
that I can hit a button on and get a shot out very quickly. I have a similar
Jura machine at home that starts with beans and pulls a shot. The Nespresso
shots are almost always better.

~~~
semi-extrinsic
Yeah, you don't want an "automatic" machine that does grinding, tamping and
pulling the shot. It just doesn't work well, they don't make good espresso
IMO. Even the ones I've used at various work locations, that cost thousands of
dollars, are pretty bad.

What you need is a manual (aka semi-automatic) machine, and a proper grinder
(I have the Ascaso I2 and like it a lot) or even just pre-ground Illy, it's
not that bad. Learning how to grind, tamp etc. takes about a month. From then
it's pure espresso magic.

For extra hipster points, buy a _really_ manual machine, aka lever machine:

[https://www.seattlecoffeegear.com/brands/la-
pavoni](https://www.seattlecoffeegear.com/brands/la-pavoni)

~~~
jacoblambda
the hipster points are irrelevant for the la pavoni, they are just straight up
beautiful machines.

~~~
13of40
Or you could buy this, plus a weekend in Hawaii:

[http://yourcoffee.arcada.vilkas.fi/WebRoot/Arcada/Shops/your...](http://yourcoffee.arcada.vilkas.fi/WebRoot/Arcada/Shops/yourcoffee/50B5/D1E1/C4B5/3101/4983/0A00/00F3/AEA0/Znaki_zodiaka.JPG)

~~~
jacoblambda
OK, I love turkish coffee so i may be picking up one of those at some point.

------
Alex3917
Does this faster-dissolving sugar have a higher glycemic index, and if so, how
does that affect glycemic load?

~~~
GordonS
This is a great point. If the glycemic index has drastically increased, then
this could actually be worse for your blood sugar levels than the original
quantity of 'actual' sugar.

~~~
weego
Unless you have diabetes markers, glycemic index is almost entirely
irrelevant, it's like people that avoid gluten/lactose who aren't intolerant.
Studies that made links to glycemic load to overall health have largely since
been found invalid.

example of newer studies:
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4370345/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4370345/)

~~~
yourapostasy
Thank you for that link. That study period of 5 weeks is not nearly enough to
evaluate high versus low glycemic index diets upon metabolic syndrome. All the
study showed was no _acute_ impacts (good to know, but not conclusive enough
for prescriptive direction). After finding that out from the study linked to,
I tried to find a study that tracked glycemic index in meals of participants
over 1-5 years, but couldn't come up with any, so if you know of any to link
to, I would really appreciate it.

------
overcast
Pretty clever way of reducing the amount, by increasing the rate by which it
dissolves. Sounds like a win for both the business side(cheaper costs), and
consumer(less sugar consumption).

------
petra
DouxMatok uses a different principle for the same result, of covering a
particle with sugar molecules in a way that increases the sugar surface and
thus increase sweetness by 30%-100%.

[http://www.foodnavigator.com/Market-Trends/Flavour-
delivery-...](http://www.foodnavigator.com/Market-Trends/Flavour-delivery-
particle-can-cut-sugar-by-half-and-is-cheaper-than-sugar)

I'm curious if both methods could be combined.

------
hash-set
Nestle and Hershey have already turned their products into nothing but shit,
so to keep trying to push the envelope sounds exactly like how cable thought
they could jam more commercials into the programming and nobody would notice.
These stupid MBAs all get their educations from the same few idiots, I guess.
Pretty sad that business circa 2016 is just "another pickle from the jar"
tricks instead of adding real value into products.

~~~
imjustsaying
I disagree that there is no value added here. Sugar consumption has a public
health impact comparable to smoking, alcohol, and air pollution. Even as an
individual I seek out things with the least amount of sugar possible.

Just ask anyone who switched from regular soda to diet how much value they
found by fooling their taste buds.

------
verelo
My initial reaction was "Great!", then i shared this with my partner and her
response was

"Fuck nestle. They are just saying what people want to hear"

Thinking more critically, I share her concern. The way they've been buying
water away from local towns makes me think they just need a positive PR spin
to distract us from the real issues.

* [http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2016/09/23/boycott-nestle-water...](http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2016/09/23/boycott-nestle-water_n_12157042.html)

~~~
huherto
I don't get this outrage over Nestle bottle water. The amount of water that is
bottled for human consumption must be minuscule compared with many other
usages like household, agricultural and industrial.

Furthermore, it is not like the water is wasted. It is actual consumed by
humans who live not too far from the place where the water was bottled.

~~~
mhalle
At the risk of continuing off-topic, the "outrage" over Nestle bottled water
in this case was due to Nestle starting to draw large amounts of water at
about 1/100th the residential water cost from an region under mandatory water
restrictions due to drought. Blame Nestle and/or the local government, but it
does seem short-sighted and suboptimal.

In general, though, bottled water isn't consumed close to its generation
point: it's packaged in plastic bottles and trucked away. There's an
environmental cost. And many of the bottles that _are_ consumed locally
contain the same water people could have gotten straight from the tap, so the
environmental cost is lower but more pointless.

~~~
joelwilliamson
There is no drought in Southern Ontario. They are drawing well water, not
residential water. A farmer could draw that much water and pay absolutely
nothing.

~~~
ant6n
Doesn't a farmer feed the water back into the well, in a manner of speaking?

~~~
verelo
Doesn't a farmer feed us all? That water goes into making products that are
likely much better for us than Kit Kats.

~~~
ant6n
I guess that depends on the farmer...

------
rogual
Does anybody care what a company this size says anymore? What relation does PR
spin like this even have to reality? They'll do whatever they need to do to
make money and say whatever half-truths make them sound good. This is a non-
story.

------
andr
Read the news with a grain of salt (ahem), as sugar prices have gone up 2x in
the past year.
[http://www.indexmundi.com/commodities/?commodity=sugar&month...](http://www.indexmundi.com/commodities/?commodity=sugar&months=120)

~~~
copperx
Ah, the old "follow the money" advice still holds true.

------
politician
The USDA Foreign Agricultural Service recently released its biannual report on
sugar, "Sugar: World Markets and Trade".

> Global production for 2016/17 is up 5 million metric tons (raw value) to 171
> million as gains in Brazil and the European Union and most of the top 25
> producers more than offset declines in India and Thailand. Global raw sugar
> monthly average prices, after falling for over a year and bottoming at less
> than 11 cents per pound in August 2015, have been trending higher to near 23
> cents in October 2016. Despite high prices, consumption is forecast at a
> record 174 million tons, drawing stocks down to the lowest level since
> 2010/11\. The global sugar deficit narrows from 6.7 million tons in 2015/16
> to a forecast 2.6 million.

That the price of sugar has doubled over the past year amid shrinking stocks
probably explains why Nestle is interested in cutting their use of the
ingredient.

[1]
[https://apps.fas.usda.gov/psdonline/circulars/Sugar.pdf](https://apps.fas.usda.gov/psdonline/circulars/Sugar.pdf)

------
binarymax
There isn't any technical information in the article, but what does "a way to
structure sugar differently" mean? Do they mean change it from being sucrose
to some other compound?

~~~
CoryG89
There is a link to the Nestle announcement in the article. Doesn't contain
much more information but it does say:

> Using only natural ingredients, Nestlé researchers have found a way to
> structure sugar differently.

> Our scientists have discovered a completely new way to use a traditional,
> natural ingredient.

No link to the patent application that I can find though.

: /

[http://www.nestle.com/media/news/nestle-research-
discovery-s...](http://www.nestle.com/media/news/nestle-research-discovery-
sugar-reduction)

~~~
cowpewter
:( I mean, isn't technically sucralose (splenda) just a "different way to
structure sugar" in that they tack a few chlorines on it?

~~~
uremog
And "natural" can mean a whole lot of things.

------
joemaller1
> Its scientists altered the structure of sugar so that it dissolves more
> quickly.

So... powdered sugar?

~~~
Raphmedia
News articles are saying that the sugar will be "hollow", so there's as much
sugar particles that will reach your tongue but they will dissolve very
quickly and be less dense.

Anyone has more information on the science of it?

~~~
miguelrochefort
That's actually a great idea.

It's crazy to think that we eat food that's densely packed with sugar, yet
only a fraction of it gets in contact with the tongue.

I wonder if they could design a beverage where the sugar somehow stays on the
outside.

~~~
Raphmedia
I guess that's why we drink fizzy and creamy drinks so much!

Personally I think that the future is in manipulating the taste buds
themselves. Did you ever hear about the "magic fruits" Synsepalum dulcificum?
It's a fruit that has molecules that binds to the tongue. The result is that
anything sour will taste like sugar. Lemons will taste like candy.

Pop a pill before drinking a bitter non-sugary drink and there you go, you are
drinking sugar taste without any sugar!

------
andy_ppp
>> Its scientists altered the structure of sugar so that it dissolves more
quickly.

Something tells me this is going to be like turning cocaine into crack. Apart
from saving them money, I bet you find people selling their grandma's TV for a
go on another KitKat.

And yes; boycott Nestle for many reasons, mostly because all of their products
are terrible for you or other people.

------
transfire
They need to fix the taste, all their candy bars taste like nothing but sugar
these days.

~~~
dbg31415
I wonder how much of that is due to "arms race" marketing and focus groups.

The current generations... our taste buds are shot, we're accustomed to so
much sugar in things and HUGE portions. You can have sugar in smaller portions
(like Coke, when it came out in 1886 was sold in a 6.5 oz size), and you could
probably have larger healthier portions... but the mix is pretty unhealthy.

Current generations are kind of ruined... taught to look for bigger and bigger
candy bars, trained to like sweeter and sweeter things... how do we keep these
toxic preferences from harming future generations? And... what can we do for
ourselves? Cutting subsidies on sugar producers... seems like Step 1.

~~~
edblarney
You know McDonald's 'kids mean' burger? With the 'small fries'?

That was McDonald's 'original burger' :)

Everything beyond that is 'super size'.

------
Happpy
Sugar is the cheapest ingredient. Why would they replace it by more expensive
ones?

~~~
slaman
You might be able to sell more volume if it says '40% less sugar same great
taste!'

------
Jean-Philipe
I always wondered why there's so much sugar in everything. All of my friends,
relatives and people I know think that everything is too sweet - cookies,
cake, soup, lemonade, ice cream, you name it. Am I weird? Do people actually
like the sugar?

I just remember, one dad at a kids party once approached me and asked me "do
you know why these cupcakes are so damn delicious? I've put TWICE the sugar
that was on the recipe!" so yeah, I guess there are people who actually like
it sweet... does anyone know of any data on this?

------
wkoszek
Eh, I remember the days when if I wanted less sugar, I'd just use less sugar,
and the word "engineering" and "patenting" wouldn't be right for the food
discussion.

------
danvoell
Is this just called dark chocolate? Kidding aside, I'm hoping they don't
replace it with some sort of chemical sweetener, I'm always suspicious of
sugar replacements.

~~~
Alex_Butters
you realize every sweetener is a chemical, right? What if they replace sugar
with sugar? There are tons of types of sugars that can replace one another.
Lots of sweeteners actually come from plants and microbes.

------
pacaro
Ruhlman's "Ratio" is a good approach to this

My peeve with the book is that he (IMHO correctly) tells the reader to use
weights not volumes for dry ingredients, then in the entire rest of the book
seems to promote/use volume measures.

[https://www.amazon.com/Ratio-Simple-Behind-Everyday-
Cooking/...](https://www.amazon.com/Ratio-Simple-Behind-Everyday-
Cooking/dp/1416571728)

------
qq66
The strawberry is perhaps the best evidence that the physical layout of sugars
matters tremendously. A fresh strawberry tastes incredibly sweet. But blend up
a pound of those strawberries and it tastes wretched without added sugar.
Since the strawberry has most of its sweetness on the outside, it tastes fine
when you're biting into it directly but the blending exposes more of the tart
inside.

------
rtuin
Is this to cover up their child labor palm oil situation?
[https://www.google.nl/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/law/2016/nov...](https://www.google.nl/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/law/2016/nov/30/kelloggs-
unilever-nestle-child-labour-palm-oil-wilmar-amnesty?client=safari)

------
zwieback
Sugar in food has functions other than sweetening, I wonder how this will
affect texture, mouthfeel, moisture and shelf life.

------
bluejekyll
Will it actually have an effect on weight gain and health? They've been
showing for instance that things like Diet Coke actually don't help people
lose weight, b/c of many other factors in the way the body responds to fake
sugars.

Will this be similar?

~~~
bkmartin
Generally, people who switch from regular to diet soda only lose a pound or
two when all things are considered. The research has shown that the big deal
with switching is that you stop gaining weight. I'll refer you to Aaron
Caroll's most recent explanation(rant) from YESTERDAY...
[https://youtu.be/znh58FZjXt0?t=663](https://youtu.be/znh58FZjXt0?t=663)

------
e40
I think this is a great move. I recently went on a low-sugar diet and after a
while I went back to my favorite chocolate bar from Trader Joe's. I was
appalled how sweet it was and I really can't eat it anymore.

------
WalterBright
I'd buy beef jerky if it wasn't soaked in corn syrup. I examined every brand,
and they all soak it.

Even bread has so much syrup it tastes like cake to me.

I'd buy more chocolate if it was less sweet.

~~~
vonmoltke
Uh, what brands are you looking at? In addition to my sibling who addressed
jerky, I generally buy Arnold's/Orowheat bread and it has no corn syrup
whatsoever.

~~~
WalterBright
I checked all of the brands at the store today. Oberto, Krave, Matador, Golden
Island, Jack Links, Tillamook, and World Kitchens all list sugar as the 2nd
agreement.

I haven't looked at them in years, evidently they've switched from corn syrup
to sugar.

------
ourmandave
Aw, I'd planned to buy Christmas presents, but now I have to divert all that
money (and garage space) to hoarding full sugar Wonka Bars.

"Who can make the sunrise?..." Me, even 2 years on, that's who.

------
godmodus
Doesn't dilute the blood they've on their hands though

------
formula_ninguna
What's a problem not to consume chocolate at all? Instead of discussing what
it really means to reduce sugar in it.

------
partycoder
Well:

\- chocolate production is not sustainable right now

\- chocolate consumption is increasing

Eventually cocoa will become a very expensive commodity.

------
blakesterz
>> "A patent is a double-edged sword. Although it protects what you have done
it also tells your rivals about it."

Maybe this isn't all the big of a deal for what it does to chocolate but if it
is used to reduce sugar in other things that are consumed in large quantities
(soda?) it could mean less sugar, fewer calories, less carbs and all those
good things.

~~~
marcoperaza
Given that they're making sugar that dissolves more quickly, how would this
have any effect on soda? In which the sugar is already dissolved.

------
tn13
It might be actually a worse thing to do if they replace it with something
else.

------
jzig
Of course they'll pass the savings on to the consumer, right?

~~~
pipio21
Well, given than cocoa is way more expensive than sugar is...

~~~
jzig
But they're not adding any more cocoa are they?

------
poelzi
I don't care, I only eat good chocolate

------
quadrangle
> It claims this can be done without affecting the taste.

Ugh, and I was about to be excited that I'd really actually be into these
chocolate bars again if they were actually less sweet. Oh well. And patenting?
Screw them.

------
Dowwie
In 2014, Nestle made $4.1 billion selling bottled water

~~~
lamby
It's almost as if value is subjective and not objective... _g_

------
afandian
It's cute of them to care about the health of consumers but I'm more concerned
about the health of the people that harvest the ingredients.

If they really wanted to they could stop using child slave labour.

~~~
Veratyr
Do you have evidence that Nestlé purchases sugar that was produced through
child labour? They claim to source the majority of their sugar from Brazil,
Mexico and India [0] while the main instances I could find of child labour in
sugar production were in the Phillipines, El Salvador and Nicaragua.

[0]: [http://www.nestle.com/csv/rural-development-responsible-
sour...](http://www.nestle.com/csv/rural-development-responsible-
sourcing/responsible-sourcing/sugar)

~~~
afandian
From Nestle themselves.

> No company sourcing cocoa from Côte d’Ivoire can guarantee they have
> completely removed the risk of children working on small farms in their
> supply chain. Nestlé is no different, but we are determined to tackle the
> problem.

[http://www.nestle.com/ask-nestle/human-
rights/answers/nestle...](http://www.nestle.com/ask-nestle/human-
rights/answers/nestle-child-labour-supply-chains)

They have been in business for years. If they wanted to stop in the past, they
could, overnight. It would be expensive, but only because of their entrenched
business model which they had a hand in establishing.

~~~
kretor
Even farm products from the US often times are produced with the help of
children:

"US child labor laws allow child farm workers to work longer hours, at younger
ages, and under more hazardous conditions than other working youths. While
children in other sectors must be 12 to be employed and cannot work more than
3 hours on a school day, in agriculture, children can work at age 12 for
unlimited hours before and after school."

From:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_labor_laws_in_the_United...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_labor_laws_in_the_United_States)

~~~
afandian
I'm not excusing the US law, but I very much doubt that people working forced,
slave or child labour have the option to put in a couple of hours work before
they go to school.

------
desbest
It's the sugar that makes milk chocolate taste good, as cocoa powder has a
sour taste. I expect Nestle to lose money due to this move.

------
sitkack
I trust Nestle about as far as I can throw them. Will swap sugar for uranium
mine tailings, water rights contracts or dead babies.

------
tonycoco
Now I can eat 40% more Nestle chocolate! America!

~~~
rjain15
Or I can use the same concentrated chocolate paste for other medicinal
purposes. [http://www.webmd.com/vitamins-
supplements/ingredientmono-812...](http://www.webmd.com/vitamins-
supplements/ingredientmono-812-cocoa.aspx?activeingredientid=812&)

------
dbg31415
Try the new Nestle chocolates, now 40% smaller!

------
malkia
NESTLE: I'm not chemist, biologist or nutritionist, but here is big chance to
make something good for the world. If this patent is good for humans, and
doesn't change taste much - SHARE IT! With today's social media, this would
only bring more people to buy your products, than not.

