Abstract
Fat provides important sensory properties to baked food products, such as colour, taste, texture and odour, all of which contribute to overall consumer acceptance. Baked food products, such as crackers, cakes and biscuits, typically contain high amounts of fat. However, there is increasing demand for healthy snack foods with reduced fat content. In order to maintain consumer acceptance whilst simultaneously reducing the total fat content, fat replacers have been employed. There are a number of fat replacers that have been investigated in baked food products, ranging from complex carbohydrates, gums and gels, whole food matrices, and combinations thereof. Fat replacers each have different properties that affect the quality of a food product. In this review, we summarise the literature on the effect of fat replacers on the quality of baked food products. The ideal fat replacers for different types of low-fat baked products were a combination of polydextrose and guar gum in biscuits at 70% fat replacement (FR), oleogels in cake at 100% FR, and inulin in crackers at 75% FR. The use of oatrim (100% FR), bean puree (75% FR) or green pea puree (75% FR) as fat replacers in biscuits were equally successful.
Highlights
Dietary fat has an important role within food matrices beyond basic nutrition
While we can summarise which fat replacers were successful within a certain baked product, it is difficult to determine which fat replacer is best
The use of fat replacers in bread, muffins and croissants were only assessed in few studies each
Summary
Dietary fat has an important role within food matrices beyond basic nutrition. It contributes to many sensory and quality properties of a food including physical, textural and olfactory factors which all influence overall palatability. In order to respond to these recommendations and consumer demands, manufacturing companies are increasingly developing snacks which are more nutrient dense than traditional snacks such as chips and cakes, which are typically high in added fat, sugar and sodium. Some examples of these types of innovative snacks include yoghurts, bars, puddings, crackers and chips which contain popular health foods (or superfoods) such as seeds, nuts, ancient grains, other wholegrains, dietary fibres, legumes, fruits and vegetables. This review aims to summarise the current evidence for application of fat replacers in biscuits, crackers, muffins, cakes and bread, and their effect on quality and sensory properties
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