Influence of Hydrocolloids on the Cooking Quality and Techno-Functional Properties of Unripe Banana Flour Pasta

Banana flour is a promising ingredient for the development of functional foods due to its high resistant starch content and its gluten-free (GF) status. However, the absence of gluten in banana flour limits its functional role in banana flour-infused products such as pasta. This work determined the influence of three hydrocolloids including egg white (EW), guar gum (GG), and xanthan gum (XG) on the cooking parameters (cooking time and loss), color, and texture (adhesiveness and hardness) of GF unripe banana flour pasta. The pasta samples were prepared using unripe banana flour (36%) and varying levels of EW (18%-22%), GG (0.5%-4.5%), and XG (0.5%-4.5%). It was observed that there was an increase (p < 0.05) in the cooking time (18.67-31 min, EW; 17.33-32 min, GG), hardness (4373.99 g-5394.13 g, EW), lightness (36.3-37.9, EW), and hue (58.2-59.9, XG) of the pasta in response to incremental levels of the individual hydrocolloids. The cooking loss was highest (p < 0.05) at 7.9% for XG (0.5%) and lowest at 4.6% for EW (22%) while the adhesiveness of the pasta decreased from -1.26 to -4.37 g.sec with increased concentration of GG but increased (p < 0.05) with increased concentrations of EW (-6.82 g.sec to -3.31 g.sec) and XG (-2.85 g.sec to -1.37 g.sec). Unripe banana flour-based pasta quality parameters can be enhanced using optimal inclusion levels of 19% for EW and 2%-3% for GG and XG.