FOOD INNOVATION & SCIENCE

A fungal protein application moving through the UK regulatory system could look like another chapter in the alternative-protein story. Look closer and something more important emerges: microorganisms may become a new route for converting food industry side streams into higher-value food ingredients.

Key Takeaways

• The UK’s ACNFP is scheduled to examine EniferBio’s Paecilomyces variotii KCL-24 fungal biomass application on September 16, 2026.
• The ingredient could enter numerous mainstream food categories, not just meat alternatives.
• The fermentation process can use glucose or dairy side streams as carbon sources.
• Feedstock flexibility could become an important competitive advantage for biomass-fermentation companies.
• Side streams offer lower-value carbon sources, but variability and quality control remain scale-up challenges.
• The bigger opportunity is convergence between food-processing side-stream management and protein manufacturing.

A Fungal Protein With a Broad Target List

The UK is preparing to examine whether a fungal biomass produced by fermentation can enter a surprisingly broad range of everyday foods. On September 16, 2026, the UK’s Advisory Committee on Novel Foods and Processes is scheduled to review an application from Finnish biotech company EniferBio Oy for dried biomass of Paecilomyces variotii KCL-24. The application, RP2305, entered the UK Food Standards Agency system in April 2025 and is undergoing risk assessment.

The organism is grown through submerged, aseptic, continuous fermentation into a protein-rich ingredient intended for bakery, cereals, snacks, dairy alternatives, meat and fish products, and plant-based alternatives. The more interesting detail may be what feeds the fungus.

From Glucose to Dairy Side Streams

According to the UK regulatory documentation, the fermentation process can use glucose or dairy side streams as its carbon source. That matters: the microorganisms must be fed, and feedstock price and availability shape the economics of the final ingredient. Relying on purified sugars exposes producers to feedstock costs; side streams potentially change that, turning low-value outputs into inputs for protein-rich biomass.

The concept extends beyond dairy. A 2025 study in New Biotechnology used side streams including orange peel, expired bread, spent coffee grounds and soft-drink waste to produce fungal biomasses containing all essential amino acids, though yields varied with organism, substrate and process. A 2026 review in Trends in Food Science & Technology identified fungal conversion of agricultural and food wastes as an emerging route toward circular food biorefineries.

An Old Technology Is Being Repositioned

Paecilomyces variotii was historically linked to PEKILO, a process that converted pulp and paper side streams into animal feed protein until commercial production ended in the early 1990s. The new proposition differs: EniferBio’s application concerns non-viable, non-GM fungal biomass intended for human food, described as composed mainly of protein and dietary fibre. Biotechnology is revisiting an old industrial principle and moving it higher up the food value chain.

Feedstock Flexibility Could Be the Real Competitive Advantage

For food manufacturers, the next competition in biomass fermentation may not come down to which microorganism produces the most protein, but which platform can tolerate the cheapest feedstocks while holding a consistent food-grade output.

Industrial side streams fluctuate in sugar concentration, minerals, acidity and contaminants between factories and seasons. A microorganism that performs well on laboratory-grade glucose does not automatically perform consistently on variable industrial material, and pretreatment adds equipment, water, energy and processing costs. The circular-economy narrative must survive a less forgiving calculation: feedstock cost, pretreatment, fermentation, downstream processing and quality control all have to add up to a competitive protein.

Regulation Is Advancing at the Same Time

The UK development is part of a wider regulatory shift: the FSA and Food Standards Scotland recently named biomass and precision fermentation among technologies expected to raise regulatory and safety questions over the coming decade. The ACNFP is now examining not only individual applications but how biomass-derived dietary proteins should be assessed more broadly; a separate committee paper notes that whole microbial or fungal biomass can raise different toxicological questions from conventional ingredients, since these materials may be consumed at relatively high levels and have complex compositions.

Approval is not predetermined; the September meeting is an assessment step, and the committee can find the evidence sufficient for further evaluation or identify data gaps.

The important question is no longer whether fungi can produce food protein; the UK already has decades of experience with mycoprotein, and the FSA describes biomass fermentation as an established industrial technology rather than an experimental concept. The next question is economic. If fungal fermentation platforms can reliably consume inexpensive side streams, they could connect two industries largely treated separately: food waste management and protein manufacturing. Not every side stream will work, not every process will scale, and turning waste into food doesn’t automatically make it cheap or environmentally superior. But that is why the EniferBio application deserves attention. The fungus is interesting. What it can economically eat may be more important.

Related on GFI: Can AI Turn Food Factory Waste Into High Value Ingredients? and Precision-Fermented Dairy Proteins Have Solved the Biology.

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Sources

1. UK Advisory Committee on Novel Foods and Processes. Dried Biomass of Paecilomyces Variotii discussion paper. September 2026.
2. UK Food Standards Agency. Register of regulated product applications: RP2305.
3. Food Standards Agency and Food Standards Scotland. Future foods that could transform UK plates by 2035. March 2026.
4. Advisory Committee on Novel Foods and Processes. Workshop on assessing the safety of biomass-derived dietary proteins. September 2026.
5. Future food court in an urban shopping center can supply feedstocks for microbial protein production. New Biotechnology, 2025.
6. An emerging biorefinery of mycelial food products from sustainable feedstocks. Trends in Food Science & Technology, 2026.
7. European Commission. Summary of the application: Dry biomass of Paecilomyces variotii KCL-24.