Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
alternatives. In this respect there has been considerable interest in the natural,
intense sweetener, steviol glycoside, which is obtained from the stevia plant and is
claimed to be more than 40 times sweeter than sucrose. This sweetener is also
claimed to be calorie-free and therefore an ideal ingredient for products requiring
sugar reduction and removal of synthetic sweeteners. Stevia glycosides have GRAS
(Generally Recognised As Safe) status in the US and, since November 2011, have
regulatory backing for use in food and drink products in the European Union (EU).
Emulsifi ers are widely used in the production of baked goods where they serve
a number of different functions which aid processing, the quality of the fi nal
product and shelf life. It would not be possible to use some processing methods to
produce baked products on an industrial scale without the use of emulsifi ers. A
good example would be the all-in mixing method to make high ratio cakes, where
the use of emulsifi ers is essential to make acceptable products. Emulsifi ers are
used to emulsify fats and oils, and also to entrain air into batter and dough systems
to reduce the density and to create a light eating texture. However, the frequently
used emulsifi ers in the baking industry are synthetic materials produced by
chemical processes and in Europe are assigned E numbers and as such are declared
on the product label.
Enzymes are also widely used in the production of bread and other bakery
goods to produce a wide range of benefi ts in processing, quality and the shelf life
of such products. Enzymes are classed as processing aids and do not have to be
declared on the product label if the activity of the enzyme is destroyed during
processing. For many years the only enzyme used for breadmaking was
α
-amylase;
its main source was enzyme-active malt fl our produced from barley that had
undergone the process of kilning at reduced moisture and then being roller milled.
This is essentially a natural material and is labelled simply as malt fl our on the
product label. The use of malt fl our has now been largely replaced by fungal
α
-amylase, which has lower thermal stability and is inactivated during baking,
hence limiting the problems that can occur in bread if the enzyme is still active
after baking. A number of other enzymes are also being used such as hemicellulases,
proteases and oxidising enzymes such as glucose oxidase.
Another group of enzymes that have found widespread use in baking are the
new generation lipases, which are claimed to act on a wider range of substrates
compared with the original lipases that act on substrates such as the triglycerides.
The new lipases show activity
in situ
on lipids naturally present in raw materials
such as fl our and egg, converting them to materials that have similar properties to
chemically synthesised emulsifi ers and therefore presenting an important route to
removing chemically synthesised emulsifi ers from some products. The functionality
of these enzymes in the processing of bakery products is well recognised. However,
the methods of production of some enzymes would not be considered as traditional
and the application of the enzymes in a particular product may be viewed as a non-
traditional enzyme treatment of the product and hence fall outside the UK FSA
defi nition of the term 'natural'.
Improvers such as oxidising and reducing agents are also widely used in the
baking industry. The only permitted oxidising agent in the UK is ascorbic acid,
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