Natural antioxidants as food and beverage ingredients - Natural Food Additives, Ingredients and Flavourings - page 106

Plant phenolics are considered as one of the most intriguing plant phytochemicals
(Dimitrios 2006). Researchers have been interested in their isolation and
characterization function in preventing diseases and their ability to stabilize foods
as natural antioxidants. In this section we discuss the most commonly used
antioxidant spice extracts in food preservation (rosemary, sage, oregano and tea),
in addition to a quick overview of tocopherols and miscellaneous plant and fruit
extracts with antioxidant potential, studied mostly under the health benefi cial
aspect of antioxidants.

Spice extracts (rosemary, sage, oregano, tea)
The Labiatae herb family possesses antioxidant activity superior to that found in
other families such as zingiberaceae , myristicaceae , lauraceae , myrtacea and
umbelliferae (Nakatani 1994).

Rosemary ( Rosmarinus offi cinalis )
Although reports on the antioxidant activity of rosemary date back to the 1950s
(Rac and Ostric 1955; Chipault et al. 1956), rosemary has been consistently used
in culinary applications since ancient times. Today, rosemary ( Rosmarinus
offi cinalis L.) extract is believed to be the most commercially used natural
antioxidant in the market, both in Europe and in US (in the area of food
preservation).
Natural rosemary products are used in a multitude of food applications, including
all types of oils and fats, cereals, baked goods, fried foods and meats. A number of
studies are summarized in Table 5.4 highlighting the antioxidant effi cacy of
commercially available rosemary extracts in ground chicken, irradiated beef,
cooked beef patties, high oxygen modifi ed atmosphere packaged fresh meat, raw
beef and pork, fi sh fi llets, frying oils and colors. Over 250 reports highlighted the
potency of dry rosemary, rosemary oleoresin, rosemary extracts and the individual
active antioxidant molecules in rosemary (carnosic acid, carnosol, epirosmaniol,

￿ ￿ ￿ ￿ ￿

Table 5.4 Effi cacy of commercially available rosemary extracts

Food system Method Effect Reference

Cooked ground
chicken (high-
oxygen atmosphere)

TBA
Sensory
Hexanal

Signifi cant
improvement on
oxidative stability,
color stability and
sensory

Keokamnerd et al .
(2008)

Chicken breakfast
sausage

TBA Effect similar to

synthetic BHA-BHT
mixture

Lee et al . (1997)

Irradiated beef
myoglobin

Colorimetric Signifi cantly

preserved color,
better than citric acid

Stetzer et al . (2009)

( Continued )