Development of functional spaghetti enriched in bioactive compounds using barley coarse fraction obtained by air classification

Developing a Clean Labelled Snack Bar Rich in Protein and Fibre with Dry-Fractionated Defatted Durum Wheat Cake

The shift towards a vegetarian, vegan, or flexitarian diet has increased the demand for vegetable protein and plant-based foods. The defatted cake generated during the extraction of lipids from durum wheat (Triticum turgidum L. var. durum) milling by-products is a protein and fibre-containing waste, which could be upcycled as a food ingredient. This study aimed to exploit the dry-fractionated fine fraction of defatted durum wheat cake (DFFF) to formulate a vegan, clean labelled, cereal-based snack bar. The design of experiments (DoEs) for mixtures was applied to formulate a final product with optimal textural and sensorial properties, which contained 10% DFFF, 30% glucose syrup, and a 60% mix of puffed/rolled cereals. The DFFF-enriched snack bar was harder compared to the control without DFFF (cutting stress = 1.2 and 0.52 N/mm², and fracture stress = 12.9 and 9.8 N/mm² in the DFFF-enriched and control snack bar, respectively), due to a densifying effect of DFFF, and showed a more intense yellow hue due to the yellow-brownish colour of DFFF. Another difference was in the caramel flavour, which was more intense in the DFFF-enriched snack bar. The nutritional claims "low fat" and "source of fibre" were applicable to the DFFF-enriched snack bar according to EC Reg. 1924/06.

Design of Cereal Products Naturally Enriched in Folate from Barley Pearling By-Products

Folate is a fundamental vitamin for human health in prevention of many diseases; however, unfortunately its deficiency is widespread, so a greater availability of folate rich foods is desirable. The aim of this study was to design new cereal products naturally enriched in folate using barley flour from pearling as ingredient. Folate content of unfortified and fortified commercial grain-based products was considered to identify the best ingredients for new formulation and for folate content comparisons. Nineteen Italian barley cultivars were evaluated for their folate content and Natura was chosen for its highest folate levels = 69.3 μg/100 g f.w. Application of pearling gave a by-product flour with a high folate level: 221.7 ± 7.0 μg/100 g; this flour was employed to design pasta and biscuits naturally enriched in folate: 87.1 μg/100 g and 70.1 ± 3.7 μg/100 g f.w., respectively. Folate content of new products is higher than commercial samples: 39.2 μg/100 g in refined pasta, 60.4 μg/100 g in wholemeal pasta, 62.1 μg/100 g in fortified biscuits and 10.4 μg/100 g in unfortified ones. Enriched pasta had higher folate retention (68.5%) after cooking compared to the fortified one (27.8%). This research shows promising results concerning the pearling technique to design new cereal products naturally enriched in folates.

Sustainable Re-Use of Brewer's Spent Grain for the Production of High Protein and Fibre Pasta

Brewer’s spent grains are one of the principal by-products of the brewing industry. For protein and fibre content, this by-product represents an interesting raw material to be reused for manufacturing many other products. To maximize the nutritional characteristics of this by-product, in this study, ingredients derived from brewer’s spent grains were included in the design of innovative dry pasta. Two brewer’s spent grains derivative ingredients, one enriched in proteins and the other in fibre were blended with semolina. Based on the rheological evaluation, the optimal amount of the two ingredients for producing pasta was determined. In particular, pasta responding to the claims “High Protein” and “High Fibre” was realized using the formulation enriched with 15% of protein-rich ingredient and the claim “High Fibre” and “Source of proteins” using the formulation enriched with 10% of fibre-rich ingredient. The final products were compared to 100% semolina and 100% wholegrain semolina pasta for composition, color, texture, and cooking quality, revealing excellent quality characteristics. The newly formulated pasta represents a successful match of technological aptitude, nutritional/sensorial quality, and sustainability.

Development of Novel Pasta Products with Evidence Based Impacts on Health-A Review

Pasta made from durum wheat is a widely consumed worldwide and is a healthy and convenient food. In the last two decades, there has been much research effort into improving the nutritional value of pasta by inclusion of nonconventional ingredients due to the demand by health-conscious consumers for functional foods. These ingredients can affect the technological properties of the pasta, but their health impacts are not always measured rather inferred. This review provides an overview of pasta made from durum wheat where the semolina is substituted in part with a range of ingredients (barley fractions, dietary fibre sources, fish ingredients, herbs, inulin, resistant starches, legumes, vegetables and protein extracts). Impacts on pasta technological properties and in vitro measures of phytonutrient enhancement or changes to starch digestion are included. Emphasis is on the literature that provides clinical or animal trial data on the health benefits of the functional pasta.

Nutritional and Technological Quality of High Protein Pasta

Pasta has an important role in human nutrition for its high content of complex carbohydrates and its widespread use. It can be an efficient delivery system or carrier of non-traditional raw material, including additional health-promoting ingredients. The partial replacement of semolina with high-protein raw materials leads to the improvement of the biological value of pasta proteins. In order to obtain pasta with high nutritional protein value and with excellent cooking properties, various recipes have been formulated with different percentages of semolina and unconventional high-protein raw materials (peas and soy isolate proteins, egg white, whey proteins and Spirulina platensis). High-protein pasta was produced using a pasta making pilot plant and the nutritional quality (protein content and quality) and sensorial properties were assessed. All experimental pastas showed optimal performances. Pasta prepared with pea protein isolate, whey proteins and Spirulina platensis showed improved chemical score and digestible indispensable amino acid scores, an eye-catching color, and an excellent cooking quality.

Use of Olive Oil Industrial By-Product for Pasta Enrichment

Background: During recent years food industries generally produce a large volume of wastes both solid and liquid, representing a disposal and potential environmental pollution problem. Objective: The goal of the study was to optimize, from both sensory and nutritional points of view, the formulation of durum wheat spaghetti enriched with an olive oil industrial by-product, indicated as olive paste. Methods: Three consecutive steps were carried out. In the first one, the olive paste was air-dried at low temperature, milled to record olive paste flour and properly analyzed for its biochemical composition. In the second step, the olive paste flour was added to the pasta dough at 10% and 15% (w/w). In the last step, different concentrations of transglutaminase were added to enriched pasta (10% olive paste) to further improve the quality. Sensory properties and nutritional content of enriched and control pasta were properly measured. Results: Spaghetti with 10% olive paste flour and 0.6% transglutaminase were considered acceptable to the sensory panel test. Nutritional analyses showed that addition of 10% olive paste flour to pasta considerably increased content of flavonoids and total polyphenols. Conclusions: The proper addition of olive paste flour and transglutaminase for pasta enrichment could represent a starting point to valorize olive oil industrial by-products and produce new healthy food products.

High fibre tiger nut pasta and xanthan gum: cooking quality, microstructure, physico-chemical properties and consumer acceptance

The feasibility of replacing wheat semolina by tiger nut flour (20 and 40%) and xanthan gum (1%) in order to obtain high fibre dry pappardelle with fair techno-functional, structural and sensory attributes, was assessed. The cooking properties, texture, colour and sensory acceptance of uncooked and cooked pasta were evaluated. The proximate chemical composition of the raw materials, and the microstructure of the dry pasta were also assessed. The results in this manuscript address the improved nutritional value in terms of its dietary fibre, mineral content, oleic and linoleic acids, and the positive effects on the textural characteristics and cooking behaviour achieved on dry tiger nut based pappardelle using 1% of xanthan gum as a structural agent. Micrographs revealed in fact that the gluten network was better formed when xanthan gum was used. Furthermore, the obtained results seem to support that consumers would prefer pappardelle with 40% tiger nut flour.

Effect of processing on phenolic acids composition and radical scavenging capacity of barley pasta

Phenolic acids, total phenolics content and DPPH radical scavenging capacity in raw ingredients, fresh and dried spaghetti, and in uncooked and cooked spaghetti were evaluated and compared with semolina spaghetti as a reference. Ferulic acid was the major phenolic acid found in the free and bound phenolic extracts in all the investigated pasta samples. The addition of barley flour into pasta at incorporation levels of 30, 50 and 100% increased phenolic acids and total phenolics content. Pasta processing did not significantly affect the total phenolics content and free radical scavenging capacity, but a significant reduction in total phenolic acids measured by HPLC was found. Drying process differently affected individual phenolic compounds in the free and bound fractions, and thus, the total phenolic acids content. Free vanillic, caffeic and p-coumaric acids did not significantly change, while p-hydroxybenzoic and ferulic acids of the free extracts showed higher values compared to the corresponding fresh pasta. Cooking did not greatly affect total phenolic acids, more leading to conserving free and bound phenolic compounds.

Effect of sorghum flour addition on in vitro starch digestibility, cooking quality, and consumer acceptability of durum wheat pasta

Whole grain sorghum is a valuable source of resistant starch and polyphenolic antioxidants and its addition into staple food like pasta may reduce the starch digestibility. However, incorporating nondurum wheat materials into pasta provides a challenge in terms of maintaining cooking quality and consumer acceptability. Pasta was prepared from 100% durum wheat semolina (DWS) as control or by replacing DWS with either wholegrain red sorghum flour (RSF) or white sorghum flour (WSF) each at 20%, 30%, and 40% incorporation levels, following a laboratory-scale procedure. Pasta samples were evaluated for proximate composition, in vitro starch digestibility, cooking quality, and consumer acceptability. The addition of both RSF and WSF lowered the extent of in vitro starch digestion at all substitution levels compared to the control pasta. The rapidly digestible starch was lowered in all the sorghum-containing pastas compared to the control pasta. Neither RSF or WSF addition affected the pasta quality attributes (water absorption, swelling index, dry matter, adhesiveness, cohesiveness, and springiness), except color and hardness which were negatively affected. Consumer sensory results indicated that pasta samples containing 20% and 30% RSF or WSF had acceptable palatability based on meeting one or both of the preset acceptability criteria. It is concluded that the addition of wholegrain sorghum flour to pasta at 30% incorporation level is possible to reduce starch digestibility, while maintaining adequate cooking quality and consumer acceptability.

A chemometric approach to determine the phenolic compounds in different barley samples by two different stationary phases: a comparison between C18 and pentafluorophenyl core shell columns

Barley (Hordeum vulgare L.) is a cereal crop that has been cultivated since ancient times. However, its interest as nutritional food and as food ingredient is relatively new. Thus, in this study, the phenolic compounds of eighteen different varieties of barley (4 waxy and 14 non-waxy) grown under the same agronomic conditions in the same experimental field have been determined by HPLC-DAD-MS. Two new methodologies were developed using new generation superficially porous HPLC columns with different stationary phases: C18 and pentafluorophenyl (PFP). Twelve free phenolic compounds and eight bound phenolic compounds could be identified in barley samples in less than 22min. The study of different method parameters showed that C18 column was more suitable for the analysis of phenolic compounds of barley. Hierarchical cluster analysis (HCA) was conducted in order to assess the different ability of the two different core shell HPLC columns in the discrimination between "waxy" and "non-waxy" varieties, and only HCA of C18 column could separate waxy and non-waxy genotypes. Significant differences in the content of phenolic compounds between waxy and non-waxy samples were found, being waxy barley samples the ones which presented higher content of free and bound phenolic compounds. Once the best discriminant HPLC column was established, principal component analysis (PCA) was applied and it was able to discriminate between "waxy" and "non-waxy" varieties; however it discriminated the barley samples based only in free phenolic compounds. Because of that, partial least squares discriminant analysis (PLS-DA) and Artificial Neural Networks (ANN) were carried out. PLS-DA and ANN permitted the classification of waxy and non-waxy genotypes from both free and bound phenolic compounds.