What is TREHA™

TREHA™ is high purity trehalose—a naturally occurring, not-very-sweet sugar that can be found in many foods (such as mushrooms and yeast) all over the world.

Using TREHA™ in your recipes can help keep food looking and tasting fresh and appealing because, due to its unique molecular structure, it is able to maintain food moisture and natural structure of proteins. Though it is a sugar (it looks almost exactly like regular table sugar) and is similar in many ways to other sugars such as sucrose and maltose, TREHA™ is uniquely effective in promoting moisture retention, enabling it to protect foods from drying out. In fact, foods made with TREHA™ stay moist and delicious for hours— or even days—longer than the same foods made without it.

Where Does Trehalose Come From?

Trehalose, which supports such marvelous aftergrowth, is not a rare sugar but is universally present around us in large quantities. It has been confirmed that trehalose is contained in most edible fungi and relates to the reconstitution of dried shiitake mushrooms. That’s why it is also referred to as mushroom sugar. Because trehalose is contained in marine plants such as 'hijiki' seaweed, it is called seaweed sugar in China.

In fact, trehalose is found in dry yeast, accounting for 12% by dry weight of baker’s yeast. For this reason, dry yeast can be preserved in a dried state without losing fermentative activity. Fermented products including beer and wine contain trehalose. We take in trehalose in our daily lives without thinking about it.

Trehalose That Supports Life

Some plants like Selaginellas and animals such as water bears and sleeping chironomids are revived back to life by water even after complete desiccation. This mysterious phenomenon of aftergrowth observed among those organisms has long been researched by scientists. Recent research has revealed that the phenomenon is primarily associated with trehalose contained in the body of those organisms. When dehydration takes place, sleeping chironomids, for example, rapidly synthesize and accumulate trehalose in the body and fall into a state of cryptobiosis. It has been confirmed that the trehalose concentration (per dry weight) in this state increases from 2.5% in the normal active sate to 20% in the cryptobiotic state. This is how trehalose supports life.

The Resurrection Plant (Rosa De Jerico) “Selaginella lepidophylla”

The desiccated form

2 hours after watering

8 hours after watering

Fresher Food With TREHA™

Though all food ages, TREHA™ helps maintain cooked, raw and frozen food's natural integrity longer with significant benefits to flavor, texture, color and crispness— it even reduces freezer burn!

Reduces Freeze

Reduces Freeze/Thaw Damage

Inhibits Discoloration of Fruits & Vegetables

Inhibits Denaturation of Proteins

Water Binding/ Retention Properties

Inhibits Starch Retrogradation

TREHA is a trademark of Hayashibara and a registered trademark of Hayashibara in Japan, the U.S. and other countries.