DEHYDRATED WHITE ONION

White onion powder is the export standard for most seasoning and processed food applications. It gives clean pungency without colouring the finished product, which matters in white sauces, soups, mayonnaise, coatings, and pale seasoning blends. Red onion powder carries a sweeter, milder profile and a pink to light brown tone that suits chutneys, ethnic blends, marinades, and products where the colour is welcome. Roughly speaking, if the colour of your finished product matters, choose white. If flavour character matters more than appearance, red is worth tasting. We supply both and will send comparison samples on request.

This deserves a direct answer because the industry is often vague about it. Sulphur dioxide is commonly used in dehydrated onion processing to preserve colour and extend shelf life. It is permitted in most markets within declared limits and is entirely legitimate when disclosed, but it must be declared, it triggers allergen labelling above threshold in the European Union and elsewhere, and many clean label buyers will not accept it. We supply both sulphited and unsulphited onion powder. Every certificate of analysis states the sulphur dioxide result explicitly, whether the answer is a number or not detected. We will never ship an undeclared sulphited lot against a clean label specification.

Pungency in onion is driven by sulphur compounds and is generally assessed through pyruvate content, which allows objective comparison between lots rather than relying on subjective tasting. Variety, growing conditions, and harvest timing all move the figure. Seasoning manufacturers running standardised recipes usually want a specified pyruvate range so their finished product tastes the same from batch to batch. If flavour consistency matters to your programme, tell us at enquiry stage and we will write a pyruvate range into the specification and report against it per lot.