Interactions with Fat Replacers

A large body of literature implicates excessive fat consumption in the occurrence of several major chronic diseases. Therefore, governmental and independent health and science organisations have issued recommendations for reducing the quantities of fats consumed. This has generated a strong consumer and industrial interest in fat-reduced or fat-free versions of many foods [52,54-57]. 

Flavourings consist of a blend of flavouring substances, which can be classified as lipophilic or hydrophilic. Fat or oil serves as carrier of lipophilic, and water as carrier of hydrophilic substances. Tab. 5.4 shows the variation in odour threshold values of selected flavouring substances when placed in water vs. oil. Due to these great variations, reduction in fat levels of foods will affect not only the intensity of the flavour but also its balance, since only little or no carrier system is available for lipophilic flavour components in water. The lipophilic part of the flavour cannot be retained in the food matrix and is released immediately. Fat-reduced or fat-free foods show high flavour impact initially which dissipates quickly, while full fat products gradually build up intensity and dissipate more slowly (schematically depicted in Fig. 5.25). 

25 Schematic representation of time vs. flavour intensity curves of full fat and fat-reduced or fat-free foods when manipulated and warmed in the mouth [53] 

In many conventional food products (e.g. fried foods, cheese products) fat or oil serves as precursor to desirable flavouring substances. Known examples of such substances are the oxidation products of fatty acids. These are not present in fat-free foods. This lack of flavour often cannot be mimicked by simply adding a flavouring 

Currently available ingredients that have, or are claimed to have, fat-mimetic properties may be divided into 5 categories  

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Schirle-Keller, J.P., Flavor Interactions with Fat Replacers and Aspartame, Ph.D. thesis. University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, 1995, p. 237. 

JP Schirle-Keller, GA Reineccius, LC Hatchwell. Flavor interactions with fat replacers Effect of oil level. J Food Sci 59 813-815, 1994. 

Schirle-KeUer, J.-P, Reineccius, G.A. and HatchweU, L.C. The Interaction of Flavors with Fat Replacers Effect of Oil Level on Flavor Interactions and Data on Homologous Series of Flavor Compounds. Presented at IFT Meeting in New Orleans, June 19-23, 1992... 

Simplesse 100 and 300 exhibited some fat-like interactions with saturated aliphatic aldehydes C6-C10 (hexanal, heptanal, octanal, nonanal, decanal), while carbohydrate-based and mixed-blend replacers showed no interaction (Fig. 5.26 and 5.27). Little or no interaction was noted between any of the fat replacers and the saturated aliphatic methyl ketones (Fig. 5.26 and 5.27). Unsaturated carbonyls showed more interactions with protein-based than with carbohydrate-based and mixed-blend replacers (Fig. 5.26 and 5.27). Of the sulfur components studied, propanethiol substantially interacted with Simplesse 100 and 300 (Fig. 5.26). Of these two protein-based replacers, Simplesse 100 showed some fat-like interaction with limonene (Fig. 5.27) and with the two esters ethyl caproate and ethyl heptanoate (Fig. 5.28). 

It appears that protein-based fat replacers exhibit more fat-like flavour interactions than carbohydrate-based and mixed-blend replacers, with Simplesse 100 being the most fat-like in terms of promoting a balanced flavour. Note that Simplesse 100 contains 2% fat (Tab. 5.8). Its fat-like interaction with lipophilic flavouring substances may be due to this small amount of fat. 

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