Baked Goods with Added Value

Actilight is produced from sucrose, has the same rheological properties and a very similar taste, with a very good flavour profile as a sugar substitute.

13/11/06 The European arm of the WHO recommends that carbohydrates represent 55 to 65% of the energy intake, with only 10% of the energy coming from simple sugars. The new European regulation should allow reduced or low calorie claims for products providing at least 30% less calories than a reference product or less than 40kcal/100g (20kcal/100ml). It is therefore advisable to replace sugar by low or non-fermentable carbohydrates whose caloric value is much lower than that of sugar. In order to answer to the requirement of reduced sugars baking goods, food technologists are using Actilight in their recipes. Actilight is an ingredient composed of short chain fructo-oligosaccharides. It is a fibre with a sweetening power of a third that of sucrose. Actilight is produced from sucrose, has the same rheological properties and a very similar taste, with a very good flavour profile as a sugar substitute.

More Taste, Less Sugar
As far as cakes are concerned, introducing Actilight in the recipe for the replacement of 30% of sucrose does not impart changes. The viscosity of the dough will remain the same, but during the cooking, Actilight will increase its development. Actilight brings cohesion and a better appearance of the crumb in the cooked product. Baked goods with Actilight are softer, have a higher residual humidity and a longer shelf life. Recently, Beghin Meiji has tested recipes of sponge cakes with Actilight and Syral’s maltitol syrups Maltilite. These two ingredients alone allow a sugar reduction of 45%, with a sensory result that is very close to the reference in terms of texture and taste.

Flavour Enhancer
Maltilite has a nice and strong sweet taste, with a sweetening power of about 80% that of sucrose. Actilight’s sweetness is lower (30%), but this ingredient is well known as a flavour enhancer and contributes to the quality of the taste. It should be noted that Actilight increases the softness, which is an important aspect of the perception of baked goods. In another comparative study made between Actilight and polydextrose in ‘no added sugars’ sponge cakes, it has been shown that cakes with Actilight have a better stability and do not lose elasticity over shelf-life. In pound cakes, the use of Actilight together with maltodextrin allows the claim ‘fat reduced’ (-40%). If sugar is substituted further with Maltilite, the claims extend to ‘sugar reduced’ (-73%).

Actilight is also appreciated as a sugar replacer in biscuits. Beghin Meiji has evaluated the performances of major soluble fibres in a shortbread recipe. Actilight softens the dough and makes it more flexible. Therefore, the spread of the biscuits is better and the development is improved.

Actilight makes the texture more crumbly and improves the surface aspect. Compared to oligofructose and inulin, Actilight brings a colour and a moisture content in the end product that is closer to the reference. With inulin, the dough is totally unworkable. In another study on shortbread, Actilight has been successfully combined with Maltilite with a sugar reduction of 73%.

Functional Baked Goods
Light cakes and biscuits can simply be an opportunity for consumers who occasionally feel the need to rebalance their diet after overeating and cannot do without their daily snack. But it is also important to notice that Actilight has no impact on blood glycaemia, and can therefore contribute to decreasing the glycaemic index of the end products. Based on epidemiological data, many health professionals believe that low GI of the daily diet may contribute to reduce risks to develop chronic diseases such as cardiovascular diseases and type-2 diabetes.

Besides, the claim ‘low GI’ is now commonly found on the labelling of diet food. Actilight is also used in order to add value to the foodstuff by bringing its health benefits, namely fibre enrichment and the prebiotic effect.

For these purposes, Actilight is increasingly used in breakfast cereals and cereal bars, foodstuffs which basically have a healthy image.

Convenient Application
Baked goods are convenient for fibre enrichment from a marketing point of view. Indeed, they are derived from cereals, and therefore may be naturally associated with fibres in the consumer’s mind.

However, statistics show that the average consumption of fibres in industrial countries is too low (around 15g/day) compared to the recommended intake (25-30g/day), which is due to the refining of cereals and to the low consumption of fruit and vegetables. Actilight offers a good opportunity to compensate this discrepancy and reintroduce fibres in baked goods without having to change the eating habits.

www.beghin-meiji.com