Today's consumer demands functional, healthy and diversified food products that satisfy nutrition-related conditions such as food intolerances, allergies and malabsorption, and lifestyle choices, ...e.g. vegetarianism, veganism, low-fat or low-salt. Cereal-based beverages have been tested as functional and probiotic foods because of their nutritious and health-promoting properties, e.g. soluble fibres and phytoestrogens. A way to add functionality and improve the low organoleptic attributes of raw cereals is through fermentation using lactic acid bacteria (LAB). The use of starter cultures with known flavour- and texture-enhancing properties offers a promising tool for in situ product enhancement, innovation and diversification of cereal-based beverages.
This review highlights studies that have principally addressed flavour and textural changes in model liquid cereal-based substrates using defined LAB starter cultures. The main biochemical mechanisms involved in the formation of compounds that play a central role in the acceptance of cereal beverages are reviewed, and possibilities for enhancing organoleptic and rheological properties are discussed.
Starter cultures able to release desired flavours or to positively change the food structure have been successfully used to increase the palatability of cereal beverages and replace the need for additives, i.e. flavourings, enzymes or thickeners. However, predicting the presence of organoleptically-active compounds is often a difficult task, as such compounds are affected by biological and non-biological factors. The outcomes from fermentations done with defined cereal and culture combinations could increase our understanding of which compounds are important for the final acceptance of cereal beverages, and how these components can be enhanced using different technological conditions and starter cultures.
•LAB fermentation as suitable tool to improve poor flavours of raw cereals.•Carboxylic acids and aldehydes as the most prominent taste and flavour compounds.•In situ released amylases and exopolysaccharides modulate beverages' mouthfeel.
Designing cereal-based products with appropriate metabolic responses is of high interest to the food industry in view of the potential health impact of the product. The objective of this study was to ...test whether a model that used the nutrient composition of breakfast cereals to predict their glycemic index (GI) and glycemic load (GL) could also accurately predict the GI and GL for complete (containing protein, reconstituted in water) infant cereal prototypes. Four independent studies measured the postprandial glucose response of 20 complete infant cereal prototypes (51−76 g/100 g glycemic carbohydrates) in healthy adults. The predictions were strongly correlated with the measured values for both the GI (r = 0.93, p-value < 0.01) and GL (r = 0.98, p-value < 0.01). The in vivo incremental area under the curve (iAUC) for glucose showed a strong linear relationship with the predicted GL (r = 0.99, p < 0.01). In summary, the model previously developed to predict the GI and GL of breakfast cereals was both accurate and precise for infant cereals and could be considered a simple tool to support nutritionally responsible product development.
This study highlights the major players in the global food balance, potential implications of COVID-19 on global food supply, and SDG-2 (zero hunger). It found that developing countries, fifteen from ...Africa followed by ten from Latin America, six from Oceania, and four from Asia, are the most vulnerable to changes cereal supply shocks. It concludes that the current pandemic is likely to cause transitory food insecurity across such vulnerable countries. The effects of the pandemic on food security (SDG-2) may persist longer as a combined effect of economic slowdown and increase in poverty, limiting food supply and access beyond 2020.
•We examine the frequency domain connectedness between oil and agriculture commodity prices.•And use the frequency domain spillover method of Baruník and Křehlík (2018).•We show that the vegetable ...oil index is the most influential price volatility source for oil.•We find a bidirectional and asymmetric connectedness between oil and agriculture markets at all frequency bands.•The volatility spillover between oil and agriculture commodities increases in the long run.
We examine the frequency domain connectedness among international crude oil and agriculture commodities, covering the period of 1990M1-2017M5. The frequency domain connectedness is examined at three frequencies, which roughly correspond to one to six months, six to twelve months, and a period of more than twelve months. We also use a network based on pairwise correlations and a net directional matrix generated from the frequency domain spillover method. We show that the vegetable oils are the most influential price volatility source for the other agriculture commodities, such as dairy, cereals, meat and sugar, but also for the crude oil. In addition, we find a bi-directional and asymmetric connectedness between oil and agriculture commodity markets at all different frequency bands. These findings validate the preliminary results we obtain using a rolling-based bootstrap time-varying Granger causality analysis but provide additional insights as they allow to see the direction and the strength of the volatility at different frequencies. Our findings provide novel information about the production cost channel describing the relationship between oil and agriculture commodity markets. In addition, from the financialization perspective, our results show that agriculture commodity may provide portfolio diversification benefits especially in the short run.
Abstract World is facing agrarian as well as nutritional challenges. Agricultural lands with irrigation facilities have been exploited to maximum, and hence we need to focus on dry lands to further ...increase grain production. Owing to low fertility, utilization of dry lands to produce sufficient quality grains is a big challenge. Millets as climate change compliant crops score highly over other grains like wheat and rice in terms of marginal growing conditions and high nutritional value. These nutri-cereals abode vitamins, minerals, essential fatty acids, phyto-chemicals and antioxidants that can help to eradicate the plethora of nutritional deficiency diseases. Millets cultivation can keep dry lands productive and ensure future food and nutritional security.
Reports of the presence of acrylamide in a range of fried and oven-cooked foods have caused worldwide concern because this compound has been classified as probably carcinogenic in humans. Here we ...show how acrylamide can be generated from food components during heat treatment as a result of the Maillard reaction between amino acids and reducing sugars. We find that asparagine, a major amino acid in potatoes and cereals, is a crucial participant in the production of acrylamide by this pathway.
Pseudocereals, especially quinoa, amaranth, and buckwheat, have attracted an increasing amount of attention because of their nutritive and health-benefiting properties, and their suitability for ...people suffering from coeliac disease and gluten intolerance. However, the utilisation of pseudocereals is hampered by the presence of anti-nutritional compounds (phytates and saponins) and/or substances that yield a bitter taste in the seeds, the latter of which must be minimised before or during food processing, consequently increasing the cost and risk of environmental contamination.
The objective of this review is to analyse issues relating to the use of pseudocereals in food production, including: i) technological limits in the food industry; ii) agronomic limitations to pseudocereal cultivation and distribution; iii) technological and biotechnological tools for addressing these issues; and iv) socio-economic and ethical implications of extensive cultivation.
Although pseudocereals have great potential for use in the food industry, they cannot completely replace true cereals due to the presence of compounds that confer undesirable organoleptic and technological characteristics to their products. As the growth in pseudocereal cultivation, especially that of quinoa, remains largely restricted to the nations in which the pseudocereals originated, it is imperative that the excessive exploitation of resources be avoided in these areas. Moreover, the improvement of the socio-economic conditions of small farmers is necessary, since they manage the germplasm of these species. Biotechnologies are valuable tools for exploiting the considerable diversity of these species for breeding programs aimed to improve palatable, technological and agronomic characteristics.
•Antinutritional compounds limit the exploitation of pseudocereal in food industry.•Agronomic factors limit the cultivation outside the original countries.•Exploitation of pseudocereals should be ethical and sustainable.•Biotechnologies and genomics are tools to improve useful traits.
Use of sourdough is of expanding interest for improvement of flavour, structure and stability of baked goods. Cereal fermentations also show significant potential in improvement and design of the ...nutritional quality and health effects of foods and ingredients. In addition to improving the sensory quality of whole grain, fibre-rich or gluten-free products, sourdough can also actively retard starch digestibility leading to low glycemic responses, modulate levels and bioaccessibility of bioactive compounds, and improve mineral bioavailability. Cereal fermentation may produce non-digestible polysaccharides, or modify accessibility of the grain fibre complex to gut microbiota. It has also been suggested that degradation of gluten may render bread better suitable for celiac persons.
The changes in cereal matrix potentially leading to improved nutritional quality are numerous. They include acid production, suggested to retard starch digestibility, and to adjust pH to a range which favours the action of certain endogenous enzymes, thus changing the bioavailability pattern of minerals and phytochemicals. This is especially beneficial in products rich in bran to deliver minerals and potentially protective compounds in the blood circulation. The action of enzymes during fermentation also causes hydrolysis and solubilisation of grain macromolecules, such as proteins and cell wall polysaccharides. This changes product texture, which may affect nutrient and non-nutrient absorption. New bioactive compounds, such as prebiotic oligosaccharides or other metabolites, may also be formed in cereal fermentations.
Grains are important sources of carbohydrates in global dietary patterns. The majority of these carbohydrates, especially in refined‐grain products, are digestible. Most carbohydrate digestion takes ...place in the small intestine where monosaccharides (predominantly glucose) are absorbed, delivering energy to the body. However, a considerable part of the carbohydrates, especially in whole grains, is indigestible dietary fibers. These impact gut motility and transit and are useful substrates for the gut microbiota affecting its composition and quality. For the most part, the profile of digestible and indigestible carbohydrates and their complexity determine the nutritional quality of carbohydrates. Whole grains are more complex than refined grains and are promoted as part of a healthy and sustainable diet mainly because the contribution of indigestible carbohydrates, and their co‐passenger nutrients, is significantly higher. Higher consumption of whole grain is recommended because it is associated with lower incidence of, and mortality from, CVD, type 2 diabetes, and some cancers. This may be due in part to effects on the gut microbiota. Although processing of cereals during milling and food manufacturing is necessary to make them edible, it also offers the opportunity to still further improve the nutritional quality of whole‐grain flours and foods made from them. Changing the composition and availability of grain carbohydrates and phytochemicals during processing may positively affect the gut microbiota and improve health.
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