Evaluation of Water Binding Capacity (WBC) of Food Fiber Sources

Abstract

The Baumann capillary suction apparatus, the AACC standard centrifugation method, moisture sorption isotherm values and freezing point by cryoscopic osmometry were used to measure the water binding capacity (WBC) of several fiber sources. Although each method was able to distinguish between ingredients of different WBC's, the values obtained by the four methods were very different from each other. A significant correlation was only found between the Baumann data and the moisture sorption data for fruit, cereal and legume fibers, while no method correlated with the WBC as determined by the cryoscopic method. This suggests that the different methods evaluate different mechanisms of water binding and that one must carefully choose the proper method in predicting the water binding functionality of fibers in foods.