Abstracts Category : Other

The influence of selected food ingredients on the release of aroma compounds from -cyclodextrin in aqueous solutions

by Lu Bing

Flavor encapsulation has been widely used to protect flavors against degradation during processing and storage. Among the encapsulation methods, molecular inclusion by cyclodextrins (CyDs) is one of the simplest encapsulation systems. However, little information is available on the competitive binding between the volatiles and a food ingredient in an inclusion complex system of a CyD so far. One question that needs to be answered is whether if volatiles from a -CyD:volatile inclusion complex will be released in a food system as a result of replacement by a food ingredient. To obtain good flavor retention and desirable sensory attributes, it is important to understand the competitive binding between a flavor compound and a food ingredient for CyD. This study provided insight into the competitive binding between volatiles and selected commonly used food ingredients. In this study, the release of volatiles (three esters ethyl acetate, ethyl butyrate, and ethyl heptanoate), was measured using Gas Chromatography (GC). Food ingredients from different groups were selected - carbohydrates, emulsifiers, and proteins. Additionally, the effect of pH on volatile release from the -CyD cavity was also evaluated. The molecular inclusion of model esters in -CyD had a significant effect on their release into water and consequently the headspace, and the influence increased with increasing carbon chain length. The headspace concentrations decreased by 20, 70, and 80% in the presence of -CyD in the order of ethyl acetate, ethyl butyrate, and ethyl heptanoate (with all statistical significance level set at 5%). Upon the addition of casein and soy protein isolate (SPI), the headspace concentration of ethyl heptanoate was reduced by 47 and 16% compared to a simple CyD, water, and aroma compound system, respectively. The observed reduction upon the addition of CyD can be attributed to the high hydrophobicity of the ester. In addition to its interaction with the CyD cavity, it can also interact with the proteins via hydrophobic interactions. The release of ethyl butyrate increased by 87% with the addition of lecithin compared to reference 2 (the volatiles included in -CyD). The increased release of ethyl butyrate is attributed to freeing of the ester from the inclusion complex into the headspace as a result of the replacement of it by lecithin. Ethyl acetate is hydrophilic and has a relatively high solubility in water, which upon the addition of a hydrophobic substance such as a protein, had little or no influence on its partition - a large portion of ethyl acetate had already partitioned into the aqueous phase. For ethyl heptanoate, because it is the most hydrophobic of the three esters, it had a high affinity for any hydrophobic components added to the system, for example the CyD cavity, a protein, or a hydrophobic fatty acid part of lecithin. For the same volatile, the type of the emulsifier does not affect its release significantly. However, similar to what happened to the protein samples, the release of the volatiles decreases