Co-creating sustainable pet food using high-quality bread meal

Bread meal as a sustainable pet food ingredient

FeedValid is specialized in valorizing raw materials and process side streams from the human food industry into high-quality, innovative ingredients for different industries, including pet food. As part of this, FeedValid processes mono-streams of high-quality bread products from the bread production and processing industry. The product streams are separated on-site by FeedValid’s own equipment and are collected daily for further processing into bread meal with a consistent high quality and structure – essential for application in pet food. Bread meal has a high degree of gelatinization and high water binding capacity, perfect for application in snacks and treats, cold pelleted pet foods, and as an addition to fresh meat slurries to the extruder.

Use of bread meal for sustainable pet food

My colleague Yvette Gerritsen, one of our valued sales managers, proposed the use of bread meal to our longtime client Bubeck Petfood from Germany. IQI has been a key supplier to Bubeck, the oldest producer of dog food that still exists in the world, for over ten years. Her proposal immediately hit the spot with Bubeck’s managing director Kai Nagel, who has a great ambition to further increase sustainability of their dog snacks and treats by switching to more innovative, sustainable ingredients. As such, Bubeck was the first to switch to our new product miscanthus fiber or elephant grass, as a sustainable source of dietary fiber, and now from fresh raw wheat to bread meal. In his blog post, IQI’s CEO Mark Oostendorp explains all about the possibilities and benefits of co-development and co-creation for the pet food industry.

Nutritional pet food ingredient

In close coordination with FeedValid we gave Bubeck samples of bread meal for testing. In contrast to the majority of pet food producers, Bubeck uses a backing process to produce their dog snacks and treats. The heat treatment of the backing process greatly improves the nutritional properties of wheat. Since bread meal is a pre-cooked and pregelatinized product, baking it again improves the digestibility and palatability even further. Furthermore, bread meal has a reduced risk of mycotoxin, making it a very safe ingredient.

Case study: bread meal

As the first product created with bread meal, in 2022 Bubeck will introduce a sustainable, highly digestible and palatable big baked dog biscuit. Would you like to know more about how Bubeck successfully switched to using bread meal created by FeedValid? Download our case study on the development of bread meal as a sustainable pet food ingredient.