Effect of cooking temperature on cooked pasta quality and sustainability

Abstract

BACKGROUND Everyday pasta cooking has a large environmental impact. The aims of this work were to assess the effect of cooking temperatures (TC) that were lower than the water boiling point (TBW) on the main chemico‐physical quality parameters of two pasta shapes (i.e., ziti and spaghetti) cooked at the conventional and minimum water‐to‐pasta ratios, as well as their optimum cooking time (OCT), cooking energy consumption, and carbon footprint, by using a novel eco‐sustainable pasta cooker. RESULTS Once the effect of TC on OCT had been modeled in accordance with the Bigelow model, it was possible to estimate that the energy saved to heat the cooking water from ambient temperature to a lower temperature than TBW was smaller than the extra energy needed to complete the pasta cooking phase. After several cooking trials, the water uptake, cooking loss, textural properties, and thickness of the central nerve (as observed with a scanning electronic microscope) of cooked pasta were found to be independent of TC in the range of 85–98 °C. CONCLUSIONS By using smaller amounts of water (~3 L kg−1) and cooking at 85 °C with the eco‐sustainable pasta cooker, the energy consumption reduced from the default value of 2.8 kWh kg−1 to ~0.45 kWh kg−1 and GHG emissions to about one sixth of those resulting from the use of the average European home appliances. © 2021 Society of Chemical Industry

Characterization of Fresh Pasta Made of Common and High-Amylose Wheat Flour Mixtures

“…Similar OCT values were obtained at WPR = 3 L/kg ( Table 2 ). As previously observed [ 29 ], such data exhibits a standard deviation up to about 30 s and therefore are not statically different at the 95% confidence level. Whatever the WPR used, the OCT for all samples tested can in practice be regarded as constant.…”

Environmental impact of the main household cooking systems—A survey

“…In this way, it would be possible to minimize both food cooking period and energy requirements. As an example, it is worth citing the eco-sustainable pasta cooking system developed by Cimini et al (2021b). It consisted of a commercial 2-kW induction-plate hob, an induction stainless steel cooking pot, a stainless steel rod mixer piloted by a direct current electric motor welded to pot lid, a digital temperature sensor to monitor temperature of cooking water and a current sensor to register consumption of electric energy.…”

“…Nowadays, cooking of food has become mandatory for humans (Wrangham and Conklin-Brittain, 2003). Its associated energy requirements represent the preponderant share of energy used in the cradle-to-grave life cycle of several foods and drinks, as in the case of vegetal products with low to medium degree of processing (Carlsson-Kanyama and Boström-Carlsson, 2001), dry pasta (Bevilacqua et al, 2007;Cimini et al, 2019Cimini et al, , 2021aCimini et al, , 2021b and coffee brewing (Cibelli et al, 2021). Energy use for cooking is largely affected by the food type and its cookery method, and the cooking appliance selected.…”

Evolution of the Global Scientific Research on the Environmental Impact of Food Production from 1970 to 2020

“…As concerning the consumer phase, any mitigation action of its environmental impact would ask for the diffusion of more appropriate cooking systems. In the case of dry pasta, its cooking energy consumption might be significantly reduced by using quite smaller water-to-pasta ratios than the conventional one of 10 L per kg of dry pasta [45][46][47] or adopting novel home eco-sustainable pasta cookers [48,49]. On the contrary, in the case of coffee the use of ground and roasted coffee instead of coffee pods or capsules would drastically cut the GHGs emitted to produce their packaging materials and dispose of post-consumer packaging wastes [50].…”