Green Raspberry is delicious and healthy
Hungary's Sugar Free Cake has been tested in the Eurofins laboratory.
On the 1st of August, the secret was finally revealed: the Green Raspberry was chosen as Hungary's Sugar Free Cake of 2024. The nutritional values of the visually beautiful cake were analyzed in the accredited testing laboratory of Eurofins Food & Feed Testing Hungary Kft. in Újpest, as Hungary's Sugar Free Cake has had to clear an extremely important hurdle, the laboratory tests, for thirteen years now.
The Sugar Free Cake of Hungary competition was organized for the 13th time by the One Drop of Attention Foundation and the Hungarian Confectioners' Association. The confectioners mainly used the list of ingredients approved by the Hungarian Dietetic Association to make their cakes. This year's winning cake, the "Green Raspberry", was created by confectioners Ádám Novák and László Csonka of the Reök Craft Confectionery and Café in Szeged.
The cake is red like raspberries, green like pistachios, elegant like roses - reads the press release of the One Drop of Care Foundation. Who wouldn't want to take a closer look at a slice of cake like this? We were also curious about the nutritional values of this visually beautiful cake: every winning cake has to clear the final hurdle in Eurofins' state-of-the-art testing laboratory in Újpest.
"The cake has been subjected to the usual nutritional tests. The results are in line with the ingredient list obtained, the product contains no added sugar beyond the natural sugar content and has been sweetened with sugar alcohols. It also contains a substantial amount of dietary fiber due to the ingredients used," said Eszter Dési, head of the laboratory.
The winning cake was literally taken apart by the experts, using traditional laboratory tools (flasks, test tubes, pipettes) as well as the state-of-the-art equipment of the testing laboratory: fat was extracted in a fully automated multi-cycle system, protein content was determined in an automatic system using a modern titration device, and sugars and sugar alcohols were measured using separation technology. Calorie content was determined by the separation of sugars, while dietary fiber was determined by enzymatic digestion, and salt content was measured by the determination of sodium by conventional elemental analysis (excited atoms and ions are produced and measured by inductively coupled plasma).
Of particular interest is that the cake was put in an oven during laboratory testing and completely incinerated. This is how the amount of inorganic material was obtained. But that's not all: it was also boiled in sulfuric acid and the protein content was measured by distilling the residue, which was digested in the presence of a catalyst at over 400 C (!). The dry matter and water contents were tested by mixing the cake with sand and placing it in a thermostat, while the fat content was measured by digestion with hydrochloric acid and extraction by an organic solvent. During the liquid chromatography analysis, the quantities of the various sugars and sugar alcohols were measured. This allowed us to conclude with absolute certainty that the cake had indeed been made without added sugar.
The studies revealed that the key values of a slice of "Green Raspberry" from a dietary point of view are:
- energy content is 232.4 kcal
- carbohydrate content is 10.5 g
- protein content is 8.4 g
The One Drop of Attention Foundation launched the Sugar Free Cake Competition of Hungary in 2012 to raise awareness among confectioners about the growing demand for cakes containing no added sugar that can be included in a balanced diet.
The Eurofins Food & Feed Testing group in Hungary is happy to lend its expertise to such an important health-promoting cause. Eurofins is the world's leading food and feed testing laboratory group, using a comprehensive range of state-of-the-art analytical techniques. The group has built a global network of food testing laboratories and centers of excellence, carrying out more than 450 million tests per year to determine the safety, composition, authenticity, origin, traceability and purity of foods.