Early January the US Patent Office conferred patent  6168819 on Kraft Foods, for its invention titled ‘Cappuccino creamer with improved foaming characteristics.’ Kraft Foods own the earlier patents 5721003 and 5780092 of 1998 for the same technology.

Besides Kraft, other firms active in this technology are Snow Brand Milk Products, Nestec, Asahi Foods, Danmark Protein, Immunotech Research Corporation, Bongrain, Beatreme Foods and The Nutrasweet Company.


Abstract:



    A particulate creamer comprising protein, lipid, and carrier, in which more than 50% by weight of the protein is partially denatured whey protein, the partially denatured whey protein being from 40 to 90% denatured. The creamer is particularly suitable for foaming creamer compositions. The foaming creamer composition, when added to a brewed hot coffee beverage, produces a large amount of a creamy and semi-solid foam. The creamer is preferably prepared by heat treating a slurry comprising the protein, lipid and carrier constituents of the creamer to effect denaturation of the whey protein, followed by spray drying the slurry. The creamer may also be employed in dry mix instant cappuccino compositions

First (of 46) Claim:




  1. In a particulate creamer comprising protein, lipid, and carrier, the improvement wherein more than 50% by weight of said protein is partially denatured whey protein, said partially denatured whey protein being from 40 to 90% denatured and wherein said particulate creamer is gasified or non-gasified having a bulk density of from 0.1 to 0.55 g/cc.

By Navroz Havewala, just-food.com correspondent