Free flowing vegetable powder and method for its manufacture

A process of manufacturing a free flowing vegetable powder, said process comprising the steps of:

• Combining onion, intensely colored vegetable matter and/or moderately colored vegetable matter and optionally other ingredients to prepare an aqueous blend having a solids content of 10-40 wt. %;
• intimately mixing the resulting blend to produce a homogeneous mixture;
• and
• drying the homogeneous mixture to obtain a free flowing vegetable powder, wherein,
• said free flowing vegetable powder has a mass weighted average particle size within the range of 10-500 microns;
• and
• said free flowing vegetable powder comprises:
• a moisture content of less than 10 wt. % and
• an intimate mixture of at least three different dehydrated vegetables, said intimate mixture represents at least 60 wt. % of the vegetable dry matter contained in the powder;
• and
• said at least three vegetables include:
• 5-60% of onion by weight of vegetable dry matter;
• 0-90% by weight of vegetable dry matter of moderately colored vegetable selected from the group consisting of vegetables belonging to the genus Cucurbita, vegetables belonging to the genus Oleracea, sweet corn, sweet potato, green bean, edamame, celery and combinations thereof;
• and
• 5-95% by weight of vegetable dry matter of intensely colored vegetable selected from the group consisting of tomato, red bell pepper, red beet, radicchio, swiss chard, rhubarb, peppers, yam, Adzuki beans, carrot, green pea, green bell pepper, asparagus, spinach, Brussels sprouts, kale, egg plant and combinations thereof.