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News > Say “Cheese” for Cheesecake Reformulation event

CAFRE

Say “Cheese” for Cheesecake Reformulation event

March 23, 2022

Representatives from small to medium sized food businesses (SME) across Northern Ireland gathered recently in the conference facilities at the College of Agriculture, Food & Rural Enterprise (CAFRE) Loughry Campus for guidance on reducing the calories, saturated fat, sugar and salt in one of our favourite Northern Irish desserts – cheesecake.

Jointly hosted by the Food Standards Agency (FSA) in Northern Ireland and CAFRE, the seminar highlighted Northern Ireland’s dessert culture, market opportunities and techniques to make cheesecake healthier for consumers. Delegates also had the opportunity to view CAFRE’s food innovation kitchens and sensory evaluation facilities.

Speaking about the FSA’s objective with this project, Dr Kathleen Mooney, Senior Scientific Advisor, FSA in Northern Ireland, said: “We want to help local businesses to produce cheesecakes with reduced calories, saturated fat, sugar and salt as part of our efforts to help tackle obesity in Northern Ireland. Working in collaboration with CAFRE we have created guidance that will support SME to reformulate their products in line with Government advice for calorie, sugar  and salt reduction. This work is part of our Eating Well Choosing Better programme, to help SME across Northern Ireland improve the nutritional quality of everyday foods.”

The creation of this guidance follows survey results last year which revealed that some cheesecakes sold in Northern Ireland can contain in the region of 972 calories and 33.4g of sugar per individual portion.

Peter Simpson, Head of Food Technology at CAFRE added: “We are delighted to be working with the FSA in Northern Ireland in producing this important guidance and we were particularly pleased to have the opportunity to invite SME representatives to our excellent conference suite to attend this information seminar.  In Northern Ireland we have a fantastic Agri-food industry which we can be justifiably proud of, and CAFRE Food Technologists are committed to supporting the industry to improve the health and wellbeing of consumers”.

Contact kathleen.mooney@food.gov.uk or deborah.whinnery@daera-ni.gov.uk for further assistance or technical support.

Cheesecake Technical Guidance