Deoxynivalenol and other Fusarium mycotoxins in bread, cake, and biscuits produced from UK-grown wheat under commercial and pilot scale conditions

Abstract

Bread, cakes and biscuits were manufactured from flour containing deoxynivalenol (DON) and low concentrations of zearalenone (ZON) and nivalenol (NIV). The results show that these mycotoxins remain mostly unaffected during manufacture. Although the results indicate that the mycotoxins are largely stable and survive processing, when concentrations were determined on an ‘as is’ basis as stipulated in legislation, levels in finished products were usually lower than in the starting flour due to the dilution effect of other ingredients such as fat, sugar and water. Thus mean concentrations of DON in bread were reduced by about 35% and 39% in white and wholemeal bread respectively which are in close agreement with the reduction required by the regulations although the changes that occur during milling white and wholemeal flour from whole wheat also need to be taken into account. The reduction of DON during cake manufacture is greater than for bread because flour makes up only about 25% of the starting ingredients. However, in biscuit production, particularly for crackers for which flour constitutes about 90% of the recipe ingredients, the reduction indicated by the regulations is not achieved. It is concluded that for some commercial processes, the whole-wheat or flour ingredients used will need to contain DON levels lower than those set by legislation to ensure that the final products will still meet statutory limits. Limited results with consignments containing low concentrations of ZON and NIV suggest that their stability and survival are similar to those for DON.

Keywords:

• clean-up
• extraction
• gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC/MS)
• mycotoxins–Fusarium
• mycotoxins–trichothecenes
• mycotoxins–zearalenone
• bakery products
• biscuits
• bread
• cereals

Acknowledgements

These studies were funded by the UK Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA), Food Quality and Safety LINK Programme, and the UK Food Standards Agency (FSA) and would not have been possible without the enthusiastic cooperation and assistance from the staff of the cereal companies involved.