The role of hydration on the cooking quality of bran-enriched pasta

Abstract

Hydration of multi component systems, such as pasta enriched with wheat bran, is a complex phenomenon due to water competition in the mixture. The influence of the hydration method on the quality of wheat pasta loaded with wheat bran is addressed in this work. In particular, spaghetti containing wheat bran were produced by two different hydration methods: the durum wheat semolina and bran were first mixed together and then hydrated (-BT); durum wheat semolina and bran were separately hydrated and then mixed together (-BS). Two different concentrations of wheat bran, 20 g/100 g and 25 g/100 g, were prepared. Size exclusion-HPLC analysis was performed to investigate conformational polymeric changes of how the gluten network is affected by the hydration procedure. Sensory properties and the cooking quality of the samples were also assessed. Results suggest that the hydration method markedly affects the formation of disulphide bonds, suggesting that separate hydration increases the number of disulphide bonds, the strength of the gluten network. As a matter of fact, samples obtained by separated hydration recorded a significant improvement of both sensory attributes and cooking quality parameters as compared to samples obtained by simultaneous hydration.