Ameliorative impact of oat β-glucan on quality of wheat bread: Insight into structural characteristics, textural...

Searching natural products to improve bread quality satisfies consumers' demands for health-promoting cereal-based food. This study characterized the structures and processing characteristics of laboratory-prepared oat β-glucan (OBG-20) and commercially available oat β-glucan (OBG-CA), whose ameliorative effects on texture and storage stability of wheat bread were investigated. Results showed OBG-20's β-glucan content was 1.20 times higher than that in OBG-CA. Both of them exhibited shear-thinning behavior as pseudoplastic fluids, but OBG-20 possessed superior foaming performance and inhibition of α-amylase activity. When wheat flour was replaced with 0.85 % OBG-20 and 0.85 % OBG-CA to make bread, OBG-20 increased water content and specific volume by 0.3 % and 8.2 %, while OBG-CA decreased water content by 0.5 % and increased specific volume by 5.7 % compared to control group. OBG-20 substitution reduced retrogradation enthalpy and relative crystallinity, further delaying bread aging. Overall, OBG-20 has potential as quality improvers to increase the texture and storage stability of wheat bread.