Storage Stability of Food Protein Hydrolysates—A Review

Abstract

In recent years, mainly due to the specific health benefits associated with (1) the discovery of bioactive peptides in protein hydrolysates, (2) the reduction of protein allergenicity by protein hydrolysis, and (3) the improved protein digestibility and absorption of protein hydrolysates, the utilization of protein hydrolysates in functional foods and beverages has significantly increased. Although the specific health benefits from different hydrolysates are somewhat proven, the delivery and/or stability of these benefits is debatable during distribution, storage, and consumption. In this review, we discuss (1) the quality changes in different food protein hydrolysates during storage; (2) the resulting changes in the structure and texture of three food matrices, i.e., low moisture foods (LMF, a_w < 0.6), intermediate moisture foods (IMF, 0.6 ≤ a_w < 0.85), and high moisture foods (HMF, a_w ≥ 0.85); and (3) the potential solutions to improve storage stability of food protein hydrolysates. In addition, we note there is a great need for evaluation of biofunction availability of bioactive peptides in food protein hydrolysates during storage.

Keywords:

• Water activity
• moisture
• bioactive peptide
• disulfide
• Maillard reaction
• biofunction

ACKNOWLEDGMENT

The authors would like to thank Lauren Gillman for the assistance on Table 3.

Funding

This project was supported by the Midwest Dairy Association, the American Egg Board (grant No.: DUNS555917996), and the Agriculture and Food Research Initiative Program of the US Department of Agriculture (USDA-AFRI, grant No.: 2012-67017-30154).