Akademik Veri Yönetim Sistemi
FOOD AND BIOPROCESS TECHNOLOGY, cilt.18, sa.10, ss.8702-8720, 2025 (SCI-Expanded)
Mitigating process contaminants in fried foods is particularly challenging due to their complex nature and mechanistic formation pathways. These compounds are formed during the Maillard reaction or spontaneous lipid oxidation. The effectiveness of a biphasic gel system (BG), combining chicken protein hydrogel (HG) and carnauba wax-based oleogel (OG) with differing quantities of thyme essential oil (TEO), was investigated to decrease the production of hazardous compounds in deep-fat fried nuggets. Adding 2% TEO into BG (50:50) exhibited a 36% reduction in acrylamide (AA) levels compared to the uncoated control group (from 12.6 to 8.06 mu g/kg), along with a substantial decrease in N epsilon-(carboxymethyl)lysine (CML) (from 8.18 to 0.98 mu g/mL) and N epsilon-(carboxyethyl)lysine (CEL) (from 2.96 to 0.01 mu g/mL). The HG controlled the formation of toxic compounds by sequestering Maillard reaction precursors, particularly asparagine. OG and BG reduced process contaminants by inhibiting lipid oxidation. Oxidative markers, including thiobarbituric acid reactive substances (TBARS) and peroxide value (PV) were lower in coated samples, with PVs between 0.34 and 0.52 meq/kg in the gels, compared to a peak of 4.6 meq/kg in uncoated nuggets. The coatings also affected water activity, with treated samples maintaining higher values (0.92-0.98) compared to uncoated samples (0.87), improving moisture retention. A reduction in total polar compounds (TPC) was observed, with BG-coated nuggets (2.5%) significantly outperforming uncoated samples (6%). BG coatings represent a novel multi-layered approach to enhancing the safety of fried foods.