 Cloud with a silver lining
Cloudy apple juice is four times healthier than the clear variety, reports Sarah Scoffield in Chemistry & Industry. |
 If your New Year’s resolution is to be healthier, switching to cloudy apple juice could help. Scientists have shown that cloudy apple juice is four times healthier than its clear counterpart.
A team led by Jan Oszmianski at the Agricultural University of Wroclaw, Poland, found that the concentration of polyphenols in cloudy apple juice is four times that in some types of clear juice, (Journal of the Science of Food and Agriculture, doi: 10.1002/jsfa.2707). Polyphenols are active antioxidants that are thought to help prevent degenerative illnesses like cardiovascular disease and cancer. Polyphenols are also found in dark chocolate, red wine and berries.
Clear juice outsells cloudy juice, however. This may be because retailers prefer to stock clear juice, because according to Shannon Schaffer, from the US Apple Association, it has a longer, more stable shelf life. In addition, consumers perceive clear juice to be purer and better for you than cloudy juice, according to Paul Kroon, from the Institute of Food Research, Norwich, UK.
Clear juice is processed differently to cloudy juice, and it is this process that is responsible for removing the compounds that many experts believe are beneficial to human health. These processes include treating the pressed apples with pectinase enzyme, which breaks down the polysaccharide pectin found in apple cell walls, and centrifugation techniques, which remove floating solids.
Lucy Ede, head of products at the juice company Innocent, said they already use cloudy apple juice in their products. ‘Cloudy juices taste better and have amazing body, which is important for us,’ she said. ‘But the fact that cloudy juices have more health benefits is extra exciting and definitely encourages us to use them,’ she added.
The Champion apple cultivar performed better than the Idared cultivar when it came to polyphenols in the juice.
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