Increased significance of food wastes: Selective recovery of added-value compounds

► Novel phase diagrams of aqueous two-phase systems composed of alcohol and salt were determined. ► The selective recovery of valuable chemical products (vanillin and ascorbic acid) from food samples was achieved. ► Vanillin is recovered in an alcohol-rich phase whereas l-ascorbic acid is recovered in a salt-rich phase. ► Based on the proposed method it is possible to improve the significance of food wastes by extracting added-value compounds.