Color transfer into sucrose crystallized from blended beet and cane syrups*

Following the changes in legislation the situation for sugar production in Europe is going to change in the near future. Due to market liberalization the option to co-process raw materials from beet and cane origin becomes more attractive. To this end the crystallization of sugar from blended syrups was studied with particular emphasis on the color inclusion. Evaporation crystallization was performed for various blended syrups and the feed syrups and resulting sugar were characterized in detail. The crystallization is performed at practically constant supersaturation followed by centrifugation and drying. It is found that the colorants from the different origin mutually suppress their inclusion or adhesion. For the industrial raw materials based system it is indicated that color values of less than 30 IU can be achieved with levels of up to 40% of cane material. Based on the experimental finding a simple relation to predict the color of sugars crystallized from blended syrups is formulated. The input data to the model are the color values of both the two pure feed syrups mixed and their respective sugars.