Question

Explain in detail why incubation time affects solubility. It has also been shown that the reaction of whey protein with polysaccharides can improve solubility at pH 4.5. Why is this particularly important for beverages?

Answer 1

Despite the excellent solubility of whey protein over a wide range of pH , when whey protein undergoes thermal processing and prolonged storage and aggregation and resulting loss of solubility can occur. Loss of solubility upon processing and during storage is especially prevalent near whey protein isoelectric point ( 4.5). This hurdle make production of acidic brevarage with high protein content difficult . Therefore, to overcome this difficulty whey protein undergo glycationwith food grade maltodextrin which improve thermal stability and solubility of whey protein. This reaction of whey protein with polysaccharide is necessary to generate product with high protein content.

Solubility is the concentration of saturated solution in which dissolve solute is in equilibrium with its solid phase at constant temperature. This saturated concentration can be measured as function of incubation time.