Cracking the code of acrylamide and Nε-(carboxymethyl)lysine: Fish oil use and predictive strategies in potato chips...

Global high consumption of fried potatoes is driven by appealing taste and edible convenience. However, the occurrence of Maillard reaction hazardous products (MRHPs) and joint control recipes have scarcely been concerned. We aim to reveal and predict how fish oil treatment for potato slices reduces simultaneous formation of typical MRHPs in air-based thermal processed potato chips. Fish oil, for the first time, was considered as a nutritional agent for the mitigation of acrylamide (AA) and Nε-(carboxymethyl)lysine (CML). The addition of fish oil at 30 μL/g significantly reduces the formation of AA, free CML, and bound CML by 39.2 %, 27.3 %, and 14.9 %, respectively, during thermal processing at 160 °C for 20-30 min in air-based thermal processed potato chips. The random forest model demonstrated strong adaptability with R² > 0.8, indicating high accuracy and reliability for the prediction. These findings significantly contribute to the understanding of MRHP control and food safety in fried food industry.