The cocoa brewer
Out of the plantation and into the bioreactor: Swiss start-up Food Brewer aims to revolutionize cocoa production. Its winning formula includes a robust process based on dependable measurement technology.
Bitter times for those with a sweet tooth: Cocoa prices have more than doubled in the space of three years, making chocolate an expensive purchase. This price inflation – the result of extreme weather, crop diseases and commodity speculation – is driving chocolate makers to search for alternatives. They may soon find what they’re looking for in Switzerland: not growing on hillside plantations but inside bioreactors housed in a former industrial building near the shore of Lake Zurich.
Substituting cell culture for cocoa plants
“The process is a bit like brewing beer,” explains co-founder and Chief Production Officer Klaus Kienle. “We select the best cells from the cocoa bean, place them in a liquid culture and then harvest raw cocoa at the other end.” After roasting, the cocoa powder can be processed just like ground cocoa beans. Coffee, nuts and berries can be produced in the same way, although Food Brewer is concentrating on cocoa for now.
Robust sensor systems for delicate cells
A steady bath of nutrients and oxygen is necessary for the cocoa cells to multiply efficiently. Food Brewer cultures them in fermenters from a brewery equipment supplier. It’s a semi-continuous process: Every few days, some of the culture broth is drawn off to harvest cocoa and the fermenter is topped up with fresh nutrient solution.
In its pilot fermenters, Food Brewer uses Endress+Hauser instruments to measure liquid fill levels, temperature, pH, dissolved oxygen levels and flow rates. “We chose Endress+Hauser because of their extensive food industry know-how,” explains Kienle. “They provided us with exactly the right products: robust, long-lived and simple to operate.” Thanks to digital communication via IO-Link and PROFINET, the system provides continuous transparency around instrument status and ensures accurate instrument readings. “We can have confidence in our process and monitor it from any location,” says Kienle.
Partners in industrialization
“Food Brewer has developed an innovative bioprocess technology that could be the future of sustainable food production,” says Jochen Kötzle, Head of Strategic Account Management for the food industry at Endress+Hauser. He values the company’s close cooperation with equipment providers and end customers alike. “Being involved with them shows us where the market is headed and what our customers are going to need.” For example, the Endress+Hauser product portfolio already includes an Ethernet-based data communication solution for real-time, in-process measurement of quality parameters. “This collaborative approach allows us to continuously develop our products and ensure their future viability,” says Kötzle.
While Food Brewer’s production capacity currently sits at just over 6,000 liters of cocoa mass, Klaus Kienle is aiming for more than 100,000 liters. This increase in scale is vital to making cell-cultured cocoa production into a commercial proposition. “We want to produce large volumes at affordable prices. And for that we need robust, high-performance systems,” he explains. “Partners like Endress+Hauser have the future-oriented mindset it takes for these kinds of scale-up projects in the food industry.”
Cocoa sourced from right next door
As well as expanding its production, Food Brewer is pursuing market approval in the US. In Kienle’s view, any widespread adoption of cell-cultured cocoa by the food industry is unlikely to spawn mega factories. Instead, it will take the form of decentralized production plants located near chocolate factories. This model would revolutionize the chocolate supply chain. Manufacturers could switch from a raw material produced in the tropics, often under problematic circumstances, to a sustainable product involving minimal transportation and creating local added value. Food Brewer is only about 10 kilometers away from the headquarters of Lindt & Sprüngli, for example. The world-famous Swiss chocolate maker is in fact already one of the start-up’s investors.
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