Protecting food with food: Natural solutions for clear label products

Fuelled by the clean label movement’s demand for more natural and sustainable products free of synthetic ingredients, the food and beverage industry is undergoing a fundamental transformation.

In the US, the Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) Commission has put food at the forefront of a national campaign focused on children’s health and chronic disease risk.¹ Its Make Our Children Healthy Again strategy lays out 120 initiatives, including reductions in ultra-processed foods, synthetic colours and added sugars.

Similar regulatory developments are underway in other regions. In the EU, for example, authorisation for eight smoke flavourings was withdrawn in 2024 over genotoxicity concerns.² Meanwhile, in October 2025, Commission Regulation (EU) 2023/2108 significantly lowered the permitted levels of nitrite and nitrate additives in processed meat, cheese and fish with the explicit aim of reducing dietary exposure to nitrosamines.³

Consumers are firmly on board with the clean label trend, too. Globally, 70% now believe it’s important that food and drink are 100% natural, and 48% regard ultra-processed foods as unhealthy.^4,5

Manufacturers face increasing pressure to adapt to this rapidly evolving regulatory and consumer landscape while battling to control costs amid persistent inflation. At the same time, there are real opportunities to get ahead of the game by future-proofing foods and beverages with innovative, natural and cost-effective ingredients that retain the full-flavour experience that consumers demand.

Food-biotech pioneer Prosur offers a range of science-backed, commercially proven solutions for clear labels across all food and beverage categories. In 2015, it revolutionised meat processing with a system of natural extracts and antioxidants to enable nitrite elimination.

Prosur’s Get it Natural™ Toolbox now offers scalable, food-first solutions across all categories, including beverages, dairy, bakery and confectionery. It enables manufacturers to remove unwanted chemicals, including synthetic preservatives, antioxidants and sweeteners such as high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS).

Eliminating sodium benzoate with a superfood

Among the most commonly used preservatives is sodium benzoate. However, regulatory reviews and industry surveys have repeatedly shown that benzoate combined with vitamin C and heat/light can generate benzene, a known carcinogen, which means therefore that its elimination from ingredients lists is desirable.⁶

Prosur’s solution for eliminating sodium benzoate draws on the ancient tradition of fermentation and using natural ingredients that support a food’s own microbial balance. The solution is based on carob, a Mediterranean superfood rich in polyphenols and D-pinitol. A growing body of research supports D-pinitol’s role in carbohydrate and glucose metabolism.⁷

Carob fruit sugars are converted into a nutrient-dense syrup, which is then fermented with Lactiplantibacillus plantarum and spray-dried into a shelf-stable ingredient. In the final food matrix, L. plantarum establishes conditions that are naturally less hospitable to spoilage bacteria, yeasts and moulds – in part by consuming the substrates those organisms rely on. It’s the familiar principle of beneficial microbes shaping their environment at work inside the ingredient itself.

When lactic-acid bacteria such as L. plantarum metabolize the fermentable carbohydrates in the carob substrate, the matrix progressively acidifies as organic acids accumulate, and the free sugars and nutrients on which other microorganisms would otherwise rely are drawn down. These processes lower pH, reduce available substrate and alter the competitive balance, leaving later-arriving or less-adapted organisms a poor ecological foothold.

This is well-described microbial ecology, resting on principles food microbiologists have formalised over decades. One is competitive exclusion: as a well-adapted fermenting population grows to dominate a substrate, it depletes shared nutrients and acidifies its surroundings, and co-existing organisms stop growing once the dominant population reaches its carrying capacity.⁸

Another is hurdle technology, where multiple sub-lethal factors – pH, water activity, available nutrients, competing microbiota – act in combination to shape overall microbial stability, each factor reinforcing the others.⁹ Fermentation contributes to several of these hurdles simultaneously: it lowers pH, consumes nutrients and introduces a competitive microbiota in a single step.

Prosur’s fermented carob syrup is a food in its own right, with a character of its own: the rounded, mildly sweet profile of carob deepened by fermentation, the fruit’s natural constituents, and the stability fermented foods carry.

This reflects the direction that movements such as MAHA are encouraging the industry to take – working with biological systems rather than against them. It draws on ingredients of transparent origin, minimally processed and long associated with the human diet, to shape food environments through nature’s own mechanisms.

A botanical solution for BHA/BHT antioxidant removal

BHA (butylated hydroxyanisole) and BHT (butylated hydroxytoluene) were introduced as synthetic antioxidants to interrupt the free-radical generation that drives rancidity, flavour degradation, colour deterioration and nutrient loss in high-fat foods.

However, studies have shown BHA can be an endocrine modulator, and is classed as “possibly carcinogenic to humans” (Group 2B) by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC).^10,11 BHT is also linked to endocrine disruption and has faced questions about its metabolic byproducts and its potential for accumulation in fatty tissues.^12,13

While the safety of BHA and BHT is technically defensible, their use feels at odds with how consumers believe food should behave. Prosur’s solution draws on botanical extracts from rosemary and green tea – recognisable, plant-derived ingredients long valued in cooking and food preparation. Together, they offer a natural, plant-based alternative that adds flavour and sensory depth to the finished product.

Rosemary offers a direct alternative. It is one of the best-established natural sources of protection against the changes that fats and oils undergo over time. Its characteristic compounds – carnosic acid and carnosol – are among the most studied of any culinary herb for their role in helping food hold colour, flavour, and freshness across shelf life.

Working within high-fat food matrices, rosemary extract helps slow the natural onset of rancidity, supporting the sensory qualities that define a fresh product. It does so through the combined action of its naturally occurring compounds. These interrupt the oxidative chain reaction at multiple points, scavenge lipid radicals before they can propagate rancidity, help bind the pro-oxidant metals that accelerate fat oxidation, and support the stability of colour, flavour, and aroma throughout shelf life.

Comparative studies have found rosemary-based extracts can delay lipid oxidation to a degree comparable to conventional synthetic antioxidants, while supporting the colour, flavour, and sensory quality of the finished product over its shelf life.¹⁴ For manufacturers, this offers the protection profile they rely on from BHA and BHT, delivered through recognisable, plant-derived ingredients.

In Prosur’s alternative to BHA/BHT, green tea is paired with rosemary to help the system work across the whole food matrix – rosemary in the oil phase, green tea in the water phase – so protection is not confined to one part of the product. Green tea’s milder character balances rosemary’s more herbaceous notes and rounds out the system’s flavour, so the blend can be used at effective levels without affecting the taste of the finished product.

Targeting aspartame and HFCS elimination with carob

Few ingredient categories illustrate the current debate over ultra-processed foods as sharply as intense sweeteners. Aspartame was classified by IARC in 2023 as “possibly carcinogenic to humans” (Group 2B).¹⁵ Yet, in the same evaluation, the FAO/WHO Joint Expert Committee on Food Additives (JECFA) reaffirmed aspartame’s established acceptable daily intake and raised no safety concerns at current levels of use.¹⁶

The US FDA publicly disagreed with the IARC classification, citing shortcomings in the underlying studies and noting that aspartame is among the most studied additives in the food supply.¹⁷ Then in 2025, the White House MAHA assessment named artificial sweeteners and HFCS among ingredients it associates with metabolic and childhood-health concerns, while calling for further research to substantiate those links.¹⁸

For manufacturers, the practical reality is less about who is right than where the market is moving – toward recognisable, naturally derived alternatives. Prosur’s range of whole-food carob syrups and fibres anchors sweetness in a nutrient-rich, smart sweetener the human gut is evolutionarily designed to process.

Carob-based sweeteners contain soluble fibre and fructo-oligosaccharides, which feed beneficial gut microbes. They also provide a balanced sugar profile (glucose-fructose-sucrose) that avoids HFCS-like glycaemic spikes, with reduced glycaemic impact linked to sustained energy release, sharper focus and improved metabolic control.

In addition, they contain high levels of polyphenols and D-pinitol – a natural combination with benefits for blood sugar management and oxidative balance. Polyphenols inhibit the digestive enzymes ɑ-amylase and ɑ-glucosidase to slow down sugar absorption, while D-pinitol mimics insulin’s action; together, they contribute to a lower glycaemic index and improved insulin sensitivity.

In a controlled clinical study, when sucrose in dairy beverages was replaced with Prosur’s carob syrups, participants had a significantly lower glycaemic response, even though each drink contained the same total sugars.¹⁹ The polyphenols and D-pinitol in carob-derived sweeteners contribute to antioxidant capacity, better oxidative stability and prebiotic potential – aligning with MAHA’s shift toward nutrient-dense sweetening systems.

[Caption] Bakery and confectionery are among many applications where Prosur’s carob-based smarter sweetener and fiber range can enable elimination of aspartame and HFCS.

The future of food is natural

As the clean label movement gains momentum globally and the regulatory landscape shifts in its favour, it’s never been more important for food and beverage manufacturers to future-proof their products.

Demand is accelerating for food and beverages that taste great, contain fewer synthetic additives, carry clear and easy-to-understand labels, and support environmentally friendly products. Solutions like Prosur’s Get It Natural™ Toolbox are about building trust by default, using the natural ingredients consumers increasingly seek – with labels that go a step beyond clean, to clear.

References

1. The MAHA Report. Make Our Children Healthy Again.
2. European Commission. Member States Endorse Withdrawal of Smoke Flavourings from EU Market.
3. European Union. Commission Regulation (EU) 2023/2108 of 6 October 2023.
4. FMCG Gurus. Clean Label – The Importance of Ingredient Integrity and Naturalness in Everyday Products.
5. FMCG Gurus. Top Ten Trends for 2026.
6. FDA. Questions and Answers on the Occurrence of Benzene in Soft Drinks and Other Beverages.
7. Suzuki, Y.; et al. Single-Dose Pinitol Ingestion Suppresses Post-Prandial Glucose Levels: A Randomized, Double-Blind, Placebo-Controlled, Crossover Trial. Natural Product Communications, 2019;14(12).
8. Loforte, Y.; et al. Dynamic Modelling of Microbial Growth in a Milk Model Medium as Affected by pH and Selected Lactic Acid Bacteria Strains. Foods. 2025;14(23):3999.
9. Singh, S.; et al. Effect of Hurdle Technology in Food Preservation: A Review. Critical Reviews in Food Science and Nutrition. 2016;56(4):641–649.
10. Zhang, XJ.; et al. A Review of the Occurrence, Metabolites and Health Risks of Butylated Hydroxyanisole (BHA). Journal of Food and Agriculture. 2023;103:6150–6166.
11. International Agency for Research on Cancer. IARC Monographs on the Identification of Carcinogenic Hazards to Humans.
12. Ren, J.; et al. Exploring the Mechanisms of the Antioxidants BHA, BHT, and TBHQ in Hepatotoxicity, Nephrotoxicity, and Neurotoxicity from the Perspective of Network Toxicology. Foods. 2025 Mar 21;14(7):1095.
13. Chiang, YF.; et al. The Role of Cell Proliferation and Extracellular Matrix Accumulation Induced by Food Additive Butylated Hydroxytoluene in Uterine Leiomyoma. Nutrients, 2021, Aug 31;13(9):3074.
14. Internal study, not publicly available. Data available to clients under NDA.
15. International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC)/WHO. Aspartame hazard and risk assessment results released.
16. FAO/WHO. Joint Expert Committee on Food Additives (JECFA), as reported in the WHO/ IARC/JECFA joint statement.
17. US FDA. Aspartame and Other Sweeteners in Food.
18. The White House. Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) Commission Report.
19. Internal study, not publicly available. Data available to clients under NDA.