Food engineer carried out sensory testing with 120 tasters
Instant noodles are offered to consumers accompanied by seasonings in various flavors. How about another one with mussel or even seafood flavor? Professor and coordinator of a food engineering course at a university center in the Campinas region, food engineer Nirse Ruscheinsky Breternitz developed research, together with the Process Engineering Laboratory, of the Food Engineering Department of the Faculty of Food Engineering (FEA) from Unicamp, which enabled the microencapsulation and agglomeration of protein hydrolyzate from mussel meat with a view to its use as a flavoring agent.
In studies guided by professor Miriam Dupas Hubinger, the flavoring obtained was added to the seasoning used to prepare instant noodles and offered to 120 tasters representing the consuming public. Through this sensory test, the author found that mussel-flavored instant noodles were well received, which led her to conclude that the flavoring could be used by the food industry as a new flavor option. The researcher suggests the possibility of also offering seafood aroma, a flavor more ingrained in consumers' sensitive memory, which would require, in addition to mollusc, the use of other marine products in the production of the flavoring.
The idea for the work arose from the interest of mussel producers, which has been evident for some time, in obtaining greater use of their meat, which is highly perishable, requires immediate refrigeration and rapid consumption, which generally occurs on the coast, as the Freezing, transport and maintenance in cold rooms makes the product more expensive.
As we know, this mollusk is made up of an exoskeleton, its carcass or shell, and boneless inner meat of excellent nutritional quality, rich in proteins and low in lipids (fats). But its consumption is low because production is located in a few coastal regions, and storage difficulties are great and processing processes are limited.
In Brazil, mussel cultivation leg leg on farms – mystic farming – used in the research, occurs mainly in the marine waters of Santa Catarina (80%), Rio Grande do Norte, Ceará and Pernambuco, although there are also smaller productions on the coast of São Paulo. But the cultivation of this mollusk could be encouraged by promoting other forms of consumption, such as the production of a hydrolyzate from its meat.
The process
In the enzymatic hydrolysis of mussel meat, the use of enzymes breaks the protein chains giving rise to smaller chain proteins, peptides, releases free amino acids that make up proteins, transforms other substances and produces volatile compounds that, together, have a characteristic mussel aroma, enabling its use as a food flavoring.
It turns out that the components of the liquid hydrolyzed product are also sensitive to degradation, particularly volatile compounds, due to the action of agents such as light, temperature and oxygen. The stability of the hydrolyzate can be achieved by transforming it into a powder by removing water, with the simultaneous advantage of a substantial volume reduction. To this end, a viable alternative is the microencapsulation of the hydrolyzate substances with wall materials, called carrier agents, which provide protection to all of them. This is a technique widely used in the flavoring industry.
In the process, the researcher initially carried out enzymatic hydrolysis of the mussel meat and separated the liquid protein hydrolyzate from the residue by centrifugation. The hydrolyzate was then microencapsulated through spray drying (spray drying), with the addition of drying adjuvants (maltodextrin and a commercial modified starch), which have the function of protecting sensitive compounds from degradation and preserving the loss of volatile compounds, responsible for the aroma.
These microparticles were then agglomerated to obtain a more porous product with greater solubility. Both the microparticles initially formed and the agglomerates subsequently obtained were characterized in relation to a series of properties of interest in relation to the intended objectives.
Finally, through sensory analysis, the researcher evaluated the acceptance of mussel meat protein hydrolyzate as a flavoring agent for instant noodles, prepared according to the instructions on the packaging. To achieve this, the seasoning that accompanies it was replaced by another consisting of salt, other condiments and the grainy aroma of mussels. As the average person approved the new aroma, the author concluded that it could be used by the food industry, increasing the supply in this market.
