Fitas comestíveis de banana como veículos para probióticos
Resumen
Considering the growing demand for products that simultaneously meet the requirements of healthiness, good sensory acceptance and convenience, snacks based on fruits or vegetables have been a strong market trend. Another trend is that of food containing probiotics. However, most probiotic foods available on the market are dairy products. With a large number of people with restrictions to the consumption of dairy products and even to animal-based products in general, there is a growing need to introduce non-dairy probiotic foods to the market. The objective of this project was to produce a probiotic banana leather. The fruit leathers were made from banana puree and a film forming matrix. Two matrices were compared – a digestible one (starch) and a non-digestible one (bacterial cellulose - BC), and two probiotic strains (one sporogenic and one non-sporogenic - Bacillus coagulans BC4 and Lactobacillus acidophilus LA-3, respectively), in addition to the presence of a plasticizer and prebiotic agent (yacon syrup). The different formulations were evaluated in terms of their physical properties and viability of the strains after oven drying at 50 °C, during storage at 25 °C and along the simulated passage through the gastrointestinal tract. The leathers presented tensile strength values between 1 and 3 MPa, the ones with BC showing significant higher strengths (p < 0.05), and the presence of probiotics significantly decreasing the tensile strength values. The shear force was also affected by the matrix (being higher for the BC-based leathers) and by the presence of L. acidophilus (which significantly decreased the shear force values). After the dehydration process, the viability of B. coagulans was reduced in about 1 log cycle when compared to that of the film-forming dispersion, showing about 7.6 log cfu g-1, while L. acidophilus did not show enough viability for counting (< 3 log cfu g-1). The viability of B. coagulans remained constant up to 187 days of storage at 25 °C. During the simulated passage through gastrointestinal tract, B. coagulans BC4 resisted well to the pH and enzimatic conditions of the stomach and duodenum, BC- and starch-based leathers released, respectively, 7.45 ± 0.12 e 7.77 ± 0.33 log cfu g-1 in the small intestine (without significant differences between matrices). Therefore, banana leathers can be promising non-dairy foods as carriers of B. coagulans BC4, however, L. acidophilus LA-3 could not be considered a suitable strain for the proposed process. It is recommended that a sensory analysis be carried out in the future with the different formulations of banana leathers to understand how differences in the texture can influence the product acceptance.
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