Virginia Dare will showcase its latest flavor capabilities for functional foods and beverages, bridging the gap of offering meaningful health benefits without compromising on taste, at IFT First.

The company, which is known for its vanilla, flavor, and masking/modifier expertise, will highlight a portfolio of functional food and beverage concepts covering trending ingredients, indulgent flavor profiles, and formulation expertise.

This year’s showcase will include ingredients like mushrooms, collagen, creatine, prebiotic fiber, plant protein, and vitamins, paired with flavors like Dubai chocolate, rainbow sherbet, oatmeal cream pie, matcha latte, and watermelon.

The concepts were developed to reflect active areas in food and beverage innovation, including alcohol alternatives, beauty from within, cognitive wellness, protein, gut health, and convenient formats.

“Today’s functional products have to do more than deliver a benefit,” said Philip Caputo, marketing and consumer insights manager at Virginia Dare. “They have to taste good enough for consumers to use them every day. At IFT First, our team is showing how flavor strategy, taste improvement, and formulation expertise can work together tocreate products that feel exciting, approachable, and culturally relevant.”

The concepts that will be featured at the show include:

• A No Island Iced Tea Spirit-Free Cocktail; the Long Island Iced Tea’s alcohol-free, tea-infused, lightly carbonated cousin made with gin, bourbon, tequila, citrus, and tea flavors
• Rainbow Sherbet Supersoda, a rainbow sherbet-flavored soda with prebiotic fiber, biotin, vitmains C and E, and Verisol collagen peptides. It is made with natural flavors, 25 calories, and no added sugar.
• Oatmeal Cream Pie Muhsroom Latte, featuring the Myco-Gnition mushroom blend for cognitive health support and antioxidant protection.
• Dubai Chocolate Whey Protein Bar, featuring chocolate and pistachio crème flavors with high protein and low sugar
• Watermelon Creatine Gummy, formulated for cognitive support, muscle recovery, physical strength, and energy
• Cherry Lemonade Collagen Gummy, designed to support skin, hair, nails, and joints
• Matcha Latte Plant Protein Shake, featuring no added sugar, sweetened with stevia.

Virginia Dare will continue with its IFT tradition of providing vanilla chocolate chip cookie ice cream sandwiches, available all three days of the show and made with the company’s 2X Pure Madagascar Vanilla.