FMCG Innovations and Trends by Sophia Nadur

Tg Green Teas do Lunch! Join us at stand F317. Lunch! the UK’s leading annual trade show for the food-to-go industry is on at the Business Design Centre in London 24-25 September If you are a  café ,  sandwich bar ,  contract caterer ,  wholesaler ,  multiple buyer  or  deli , then  Lunch!  is your most important date of the year. There really is no substitute for doing business face to face and at  Lunch!  you will be able to meet  over 350 suppliers  in the food & drink industry, from the largest manufacturers to the small, innovative start-up producers........including  Tg Green Teas ! Find us on  stand number  F317. What's so special about Tg and why is it right for Lunch! What makes Tg different from other iced teas and / or new-to-market drinks that tout "healthy" credentials?   Iced Tg  is a deliciously natural energy infusion usin...

Jamie Oliver's #Sugarrush a game changer? Famed restauranteur and foodie  Jamie Oliver  ramped up the anti-sugar campaign with a stomach churning  TV programme  showing the effects of sugar over-consumption on kids' teeth and diabetic folks' health (Channel 4 on 3/Sept ), a  public petition  that has attracted nearly 150,000 signatures (sign up  here ), and a stirring performance at a government health committee meeting on 19/Oct.  His insights and actions  may be the  game changer  Action on Sugar and other lobby groups have been looking for in their well meaning efforts to tackle the growing obesity problem here in Britain. I support wholeheartedly  Jamie Oliver 's challenge to government to add a  20p/litre tax on soft drinks  and make  front-of-pack nutritional labelling mandatory  in an effort to help us reduce our daily  #sugarrush . In my view, a sugar tax could work if i...

Move over  acai  and  goji berry , here comes  JUJUBE !  Tg Green Tea wins Great Taste Award Gold Stars….including 1 blend containing an exciting new superfruit. The world’s most coveted blind-tasted food awards, Gr eat Taste , has just released the  Great Taste stars of 2015  and Hua and Sophia, co-founders of a new London-based beverage company  Tg Green Teas , are amongst the producers celebrating  Gold star wins.  Tg Green Teas  recently won  a gold star for two of its hot blends , namely Green Tea and  Green Tea with Jujube & Osmanthus.   The Great Taste Award judges also noted their discovery of a tasty new fruit, the JUJUBE, during their feedback. So just what is this delicious new superfruit – the jujube? Jujube  fruit or Chinese red date ( hong zao 红枣 ) – pronounced “joo-joob” – has been cultivated in China for more than 4,000 years. Having the  texture and flavour of an apple...

The  Speciality & Fine Food Fair  is coming to London (UK) on  6th – 8th September 2015  and there will be as usual a number of new speciality food & drink from across the world exhibiting at the trade show. Tg Green Teas  will be on  STAND 4468  showcasing their refreshingly delicious new range of hot and iced green teas including their  Great Taste Award Gold Star winners  Tg Green Tea and Tg Green Tea with Jujube & Osmanthus.  Click HERE  if you would like to register for a  FREE TRADE PASS  to access the  3 day Speciality & Fine Food Fair . Hua and I look forward to sharing a cup of tea and a chat at our stand. Ancient green tea and wellness traditions, blended into refreshing hot and chilled brews,  Tg Green Teas  are natural energy infusions using delicious ingredients, some borrowed some new. Inspired by the  Middle Kingdom , designed and developed in  Britain ,...

I agree with  Ian Quin  that  monk fruit  is a potential  “breakthrough” natural sweetener  (" Sweet and Innocent? ", 9 Aug, p24. The Grocer). Named for the  Chinese Buddhist monks  who cultivated it for centuries,  monk fruit  is part of a basket of fruit and herbs (that includes ginger , jujube , rhubarb and osmanthus ) used in China in traditional medicine and everyday food & drink.  The U.S.  FDA  first granted  zero calorie  monk fruit approval back in 2010 and it’s been in use since in a number of countries outside of Asia under brand names like  Nectresse, Monk Fruit in the Raw, Fruit Sweetness, Sweet-Delicious, and PureLo . Monk fruit sweetened drinks have less of the perceived bitter liquorice aftertaste of  stevia  particularly in  juice based applications , hence it’s potential.  [It surprised me a bit during a panel discussion at  FoodVision  in...

Tesco 's announcement earlier last week regarding the removal of added-sugar juice drinks targeted at kids resulted in a noisy backlash by the public on various social media sites.  It's a pity on two fronts. Tesco's initiative helps deliver healthier lunch boxes Firstly, I applaud wholeheartedly  Tesco 's initiative to help ensure school kids have healthier drinks in their lunch boxes.  David Beardmore ,  Tesco 's Category Buying Manager for Soft Drinks and Juices, has long been at the forefront calling on manufacturers to reformulate and deliver healthier drinks to Tesco stores. His move was rightly lauded by many parents up and down the country as well as key health lobby groups e.g.  Action on Sugar 's  Kawther Hashem  who said “This is great news from  Tesco ; it shows they are taking the issue of sugar in soft drinks seriously." .....but we don't need no nanny state, says the consumer! The social media backlash over "#...

You may have read on  drinktg.com  about what motivated Hua and I to develop  Tg , ancient wellness traditions blended into refreshingly delicious hot & chilled brews. We also say that  our iced Tg Green Teas are like nothing you have ever tried before . Since we both are fed up reading ridiculous - and often irresponsible - claims made by food & drink brands, we want you to understand why say we this and why  Datamonitor  likes Tg for naturalness and functionality. People are asking more and more for two things from their drink choices, namely (i) get rid of the "bad stuff" and (ii) put in more "good stuff". By " bad stuff ", people mean high levels of sugar and calories as well as artificial sweeteners, colours and preservatives. We have all  started reading more closely the labels on our everyday food & drink choices . Most of what we have read shocked us. We didn't imagine just how many calories were actually i...