Edible oil‐in‐water emulsions stabilized by hydrophile–lipophile balanced sucrose ester

Abstract

AbstractConventional emulsions are mostly stabilized by surfactants and for stabilization of oil‐in‐water emulsions the surfactants should be hydrophilic or with HLB numbers larger than seven. In this work, we report that edible oil‐in‐water emulsions can also be stabilized by surfactants with an HLB value close to seven. With edible sucrose ester C‐1807 (HLB no. = 7) as emulsifier and three edible oils (canola oil, olive oil, soybean oil), edible oil‐in‐water emulsions can be stabilized by C‐1807 at concentrations beyond its critical aggregation concentration (CAC). Although monomeric C‐1807 behaves as an inferior emulsifier, they assemble to form multilamellar vesicles in water at concentrations higher than the CAC giving a viscoelastic/gel‐like aqueous phase which is partly responsible for emulsion stabilization. Specifically, at 2 wt%, high internal phase emulsions (HIPEs) with ϕo = 0.75 can be obtained, which are stable against cooling–heating cycles between 5 and 30°C during storage. The vesicles disperse in the aqueous lamellae surrounding the oil droplets, which together with the viscoelastic/gel‐like continuous phase prevents them from flocculation and coalescence.