AN ANION EXCHANGE RESIN TREATMENT FOR IMPROVING THE TASTE OF COTTAGE CHEESE WHEY

Abstract

ABSTRACTThe characteristic salty taste of cheese whey was attributed mostly to CaCl2, based on flavor evaluation of individual salts which conform to the milk salt composition. The removal of chlorides using anion exchange resins was investigated to reduce the salty taste of cottage cheese whey. Strongly basic anion exchangers, Rexyn 201 and 202 were more efficient in chloride removal than weakly basic exchangers, Amberlites 45, 68 and 98. Rexyn 202 was preferred to 201 due to requirement of a smaller volume of regenerant. Rexyn 202 regenerated with NaOH alone caused 70% destruction of riboflavin. Rexyn 202 prevented this destruction when regenerated with NaOH then with phosphoric acid; however, the extent of flavor improvement was unsatisfactory although significant. The regeneration of Rexyn 202 with NaOH then with gluconic acid demonstrated best results in terms of flavor improvement. The flavor close to that of the conventional two‐resin method was obtained by this method with almost no losses of Ca and riboflavin from cottage cheese whey compared to 70% and approximately 30% losses of Ca and riboflavin, respectively by the conventional cation‐anion exchange process. Significant flavor improvement of cottage cheese whey was achieved by the single resin column method for desalting, which is simpler than the conventional ion exchange methods using both cation and anion exchange resins.