Introduction:One of the challenges with whole grain ingredients, foods and meals is that they typically have a shorter shelf-life compared to equivalent products that contain refined grains, without a bran layer. This is primarily due to lipid degradation that leads to rancidity and is a major impediment to the further development of whole grain products. The consequent reduction in shelf life is due to the production of molecules with unpleasant scent and flavour caused by the lipid degradation which result from chemical or enzymatic modification of (primarily) bran-based lipids.The rate and extent of lipid degradation depends upon many factors including: the composition and structure of the seed/grain, the types of lipid present, the moisture content and any external catalysts such as the presence of some metals or simply exposure to light.
Materials and methods:This work includes a comprehensive study of the different biological seed groups used in the food industry when creating different whole grain products included under the "whole grain" and "whole meal" label. The 11 samples selected were barley, red sorghum, white sorghum, teff, red quinoa, white quinoa, buckwheat, sunflower, flax, white chia and black chia. The samples (n=1188) were stored ground and intact under three different storage conditions at three different temperatures (4, 23, and 38°C) for up to 4 months to examine the reactions occurring in the samples: from the fresh seed (fatty acid composition), followed by lipid degradation, from hydroperoxides (hydroperoxide value), up to the volatile compounds production (head space analysis) at days 0, 2, 5, 10, 15, 20, 30, 60 and 110. Multivariate analysis was performed to identify the differences between samples, storage conditions and lipid composition. Based on these results: furan 2-ethyl-, furan 2-pentyl-, pentanal, heptanal, octanal, nonanal and 2-heptanone are the analytes that showed a statistical relation (p<0.05) and were strongly positively correlated with storage time were studied in detail. The goal was to find molecules that show a stable increase with time and could potentially be good quantitative markers of lipid degradation, so with future work and relating with sensory studies they could become markers of rancidity. A selection of samples were then used in an experiment to evaluate options to extend the shelf-life of ground whole grains, using natural treatments. The samples selected were: barley, quinoa white and flax, and they were treated with natural antioxidants (lemon myrtle and rosemary-tocopherol) and thermal treatments (dry heat and wet heat), compared with a chemical antioxidant (BHA) during storage for 14weeks at room temperature in closed vials. Headspace analysis was performed after 2, 4, 8 and 14weeks.
Results:The results show that the seed fatty acid composition has a strong impact on lipid stability, except in the case of flax and chia black which based on the fatty acid composition should have been very unstable but were not. Endogenous antioxidant capacity can re...