Effect of Green Tea Extract in Reducing the Formation of Acrylamide From Bread Baking Process

Abstract

Bread is one of the most famous foods worldwide. It is consumed as a staple food for many Western countries and contains high content of carbohydrates. Nowadays, an increasing number of people prefer healthy foods. Tea antioxidants have drawn increased attention in recent years because of their potential health benefits, not only as an antioxidant agent but also as antiarteriosclerotic, anticarcinogenic, and antimicrobial agents. In this project, a new bread product with added green tea extract (GTE) was developed with reduced acrylamide content. The objectives of this research were to investigate the effect of GTE addition on reducing acrylamide formation in white bread loaf and whether GTE addition has any effect on changing the physicochemical properties of the bread. My hypothesis was that the fortification of bread with GTE will reduce the acrylamide content with improved physicochemical property. In my study, bread formulations with GTEs at 3.3 g, 6.6 g and 9.9 g per kg of flour were developed. All of the fortified bread samples showed significant decrease in acrylamide content and moisture content with the addition of GTE. The acrylamide content has been reduced from 52.19 µg.L‾ ¹ to 32.69 µg.L‾ ¹. There was no significant difference between the control and the GTE added samples except cohesiveness from texture analysis. The crust of the GTE added bread was significantly increased (p < 0.05) in lightness L* (53.92 to 65.85) and yellowness b* (25.64 to 27.12), while decreased in redness a* (9.36 to 9.14). Contrasting result was found in crumb according to the L*, a*, b* colour system.

Overall, the results showed that the incorporation of GTE inhibited the acrylamide formation and changed the physicochemical properties of bread. The outcome of the present study will have great health implication on the use of GTE to develop functional foods with anti-cancer potential and be helpful to the development of healthier food products in the future.