In the beginning, gluten was mainly used in baked goods. However, with the improvement of understanding of its unique structure and functional characteristics, the application of gluten is more and more extensive. To sum up, it mainly focuses on the following aspects:
The most basic use of gluten is to adjust the protein content of flour. Many local flour manufacturers meet the requirements of bread flour by adding gluten to low-gluten flour without mixing expensive and imported high-gluten flour. This method has been widely adopted in Europe. Similarly, bread makers use gluten to fortify ordinary flour without having to store a lot of high-gluten flour.
The unique viscoelasticity of gluten can improve the strength, mixing and handling properties of dough; Its film-forming foaming ability can preserve air to control expansion and improve volume, symmetry and texture; Its thermosetting property provides necessary structural strength and chewing characteristics; Its water absorbing capacity improves the product yield, softness and shelf life of baked products.
It is estimated that about 70% of gluten is used to produce bread, desserts and various fermented products. According to the specific use, texture and shelf life requirements of baked food, the amount of gluten is different. For example, adding about 1% gluten to wheat flour can reduce the breakage rate of pretzels, but adding too much gluten may make pretzels too hard to eat. Using about 2% gluten in pre-cut hamburger and hot dog bread can improve its strength and provide the bread with the desired crispy characteristics.
In the production of fine dried noodles, when 1%-2% gluten is added, the dough sheet is well formed and the softness is increased, so the operability is improved, the tendon strength is increased and the touch is improved. When cooking noodles, it can reduce the dissolution of noodle ingredients into soup, improve the yield of cooking noodles, prevent noodles from being too soft or broken, and increase the noodle extension effect.
Gluten can combine fat and water and increase protein content, which makes gluten widely used in meat, fish and poultry products. Gluten improves the utilization of beef, pork and mutton through the process of tissue reconstruction, and gluten can be cut into more delicious steak products to convert unsatisfactory fresh meat. Gluten has good planing properties. For meat products processing, such as poultry rolls, "whole" canned ham and other non-specific bread products, it improves the planing characteristics and reduces the loss during cooking.
In meat products, gluten has many advantages as the binder, filler or extender. The use of 1%-5% gluten as the binder in meat products gives products many advantages, such as increasing viscoelasticity, color stability, hardness, juice yield and water-retaining property, and reducing oil-holding capacity and processing loss. Its solidification characteristics are conducive to improving rheological properties, enhancing tabletting ability and maintaining sensory characteristics.
The unique adhesiveness, film formability and thermosetting property of wheat gluten are helpful to bond meat and fruits and vegetables together to make steak, and gluten can also be sprinkled on meat slices. It can also be used in canned hamburgers and bread slices to reduce processing and cooking losses. The addition amount of gluten is 2%-3.5% of its mass. In addition, gluten is also used in meat patties, and sometimes it can be used as the binder for sausages and some meat products. When the gluten is hydrated, its structure expands and can be drawn into silk, thread or film, which can be used to make various artificial meats. For example, gluten can produce crab meat analogues and even artificial caviar, and gluten dissolved in alcohol can be used to prepare peelable edible films, such as casing films.
Another main use of gluten is as the vegetarian food to replace meat, and to produce artificial expensive meat, such as seafood and crab analogues. Especially in Japan, more and more consumers are looking for meat substitutes because of increasing concern about health and food safety. Pure wet gluten can be seasoned, deformed and processed into meatballs and steaks. Textured wheat gluten can be used to imitate the taste, chewiness and taste of meat by extrusion technology. The "meat" product made by this method is suitable as an instant main course, and it can also be used as the sandwich filling or a pizza and salad ingredient. Gluten can play the meat-like role in the "vegetarian hamburger".
Gluten with high protein content is also favored by the pet food industry. Canned sausages and liquid foods mainly use the water-absorbing quality and liposuction emulsification of gluten, which can improve the yield and quality at the same time; When preparing dog food biscuits, gluten is added to the dough before baking, which can improve the crushing resistance of the finished product in the process of packaging and transportation, and gluten also provides important nutrition.
Because of the unique flavor and nutrition of gluten, cereal food fortified with gluten has been widely accepted by consumers, especially it is eaten with milk. Such as: Cola Cao. Because gluten not only provides necessary nutritional requirements, but also helps to bind vitamins and minerals together in processing and strengthen cereal food. Among nutritious snacks, gluten provides rich nutrition and crispness. Generally, the dosage is 1% ~ 2%. But in Australia, the mass fraction of gluten in some products reaches 30%-45%. One example of the high-protein snack is one kind of pasta containing potato chips, bread crumbs and gluten.
Synthetic cheese made from gluten is no different from natural cheese in texture and taste. Recent research by the International Wheat Gluten Association shows that gluten alone or in combination with soy protein can partially replace the expensive sodium caseinate and it greatly reduces the production cost of cheese.Gluten is also used to strengthen the surface of the pizza, provide the hard crust and the crisp taste, make the outer crust crisp, increase chewiness, and reduce the transfer of moisture from the sauce to the interior of the pizza. The addition amount is 1%-2% of wheat flour matrix.
Gluten is also used to make soy sauce and monosodium. The high glutamine content of gluten makes it an ideal primary material for manufacturing the latter. Compared with traditional soy sauce, soy sauce made of gluten has light color, slow browning rate, excellent flavor and good denseness.
Gluten not only has unique physical characteristics and all-naturalness, but also can meet the multifunctional needs of food. It is rich in sources and simple in production technology. Therefore, it will play an unparalleled role in food industry and feed industry, whether as the protein source or the additive, such as bread, noodles, ancient meat, vegetarian sausage, vegetarian chicken, meat products, etc. In addition, after modification, its emulsibility, foaming characteristic and so on have been improved. The scope of its application has been further expanded.Therefore, gluten has broad application and development prospects.