It's a pleasure to have Parker Freeze Dry with us at Bridge2Food North America 2026. What made this the right event for Parker Freeze Dry to join?
Bridge2Food excels at bringing people together to discuss some of the most interesting questions in plant-protein development, such as how do we improve functionality or how can we create more value from emerging or underused protein sources? And then, how do we make those ideas work at commercial scale?
That makes it a natural conversation for us. Freeze-drying is already well established in other food categories, but we think there are plant-protein applications that deserve a closer look. We’re coming to Bridge2Food to add that processing perspective and hopefully get people thinking differently about where shelf life and preservation fit into ingredient development.
Scaling freeze-drying operations from pilot testing to commercial production is a major milestone for food companies. What makes Parker Freeze Dry uniquely positioned to support manufacturers throughout that growth journey?
One of the biggest challenges to launching any freeze-dried product is figuring out how to move from “this works” to “we can run this reliably at production scale.”
That’s where Parker spends a lot of its time with customers. Our systems allow manufacturers to add commercial capacity in stages rather than treating freeze-drying as one large, all-at-once investment. Just as importantly, our team helps customers think through the practical side of implementation, including product characteristics, throughput, facility requirements, process controls and what the freeze-dried output ultimately needs to accomplish downstream.
When we talk about scaling your production, it’s more than a quantity question. It’s about creating a repeatable process that still delivers the value you proved in development.
Processing methods play a critical role in determining the sensory and functional qualities of plant-protein ingredients. What new formulation possibilities can freeze-drying open up for ingredient manufacturers in this session?
Sometimes the value of a plant protein depends on a function that can be changed during freeze-drying.
For example, recent studies published in Food Chemistry on plant proteins such as cowpea albumin, hemp and quinoa show that the drying method can influence properties including foaming, emulsification, oil holding, solubility and gel performance. Freeze-drying has shown advantages for some of those functions, particularly where limiting thermal exposure matters.
In our session, we’re going to dive more deeply into what that means practically. Rather than asking whether freeze-drying is universally “better,” processors should ask what their protein needs to do in the next formulation, and whether freeze-drying could help protect that specific value. That opens up interesting possibilities for specialized proteins, new plant sources and ingredients recovered from underused side streams.
Looking ahead, what recent news, technical developments, or key milestones at Parker Freeze Dry is the company most excited to share with the industry?
One area we’re especially excited about is giving processors better visibility into what is actually possible with today’s freeze-drying technology.
Specifically, Parker’s KPI capabilities are designed to turn cycle data into information manufacturers can use to evaluate performance over time, from cycle efficiency and throughput to yield, downtime and other operational measures. For Bridge2Food attendees, that matters because if you’re taking a new plant-protein ingredient from development to production, it requires more than proving that it can be freeze-dried once. You need to understand whether the process is repeatable, where it can be optimized and how it performs as you scale.
We see that combination of preservation technology and better process data as an important next step for commercial freeze-drying.
