Enzymes in Food Technology

November 15, 2017 | Author: npgy | Category: Active Site, Protein Folding, Hydrolysis, Enzyme, Catalysis
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Enzymes in Food Technology


Sheffield Academic Press CRC Press

Enzymes in Food Technology

Sheffield Food Technology Series Editors: B.A. Law and A.J. Taylor A series which presents the current state of the art of chosen sectors of the food and beverage industry. Written at professional and reference level, it is directed at food scientists and technologists, ingredients suppliers, packaging technologists, quality assurance personnel, analytical chemists and microbiologists. Each volume in the series provides an accessible source of information on the science and technology of a particular area. Titles in the series: Chemistry and Technology of Soft Drinks and Fruit Juices Edited by P.R. Ashurst Natural Toxicants in Food Edited by D.H. Watson Technology of Bottled Water Edited by D.A.G. Senior and P.R. Ashurst Environmental Contaminants in Food Edited by C.F. Moffat and K.J. Whittle Handbook of Beverage Packaging Edited by G.A. Giles Technology of Cheesemaking Edited by B.A. Law Mechanisation and Automation in Dairy Technology Edited by A.Y. Tamime and B.A. Law Enzymes in Food Technology Edited by R.J. Whitehurst and B.A. Law

Enzymes in Food Technology Edited by ROBERT J. WHITEHURST Kerry SPP Cambridge, UK and

BARRY A. LAW Food Science Australia Victoria Australia

Sheffield Academic Press

CRC Press

First published 2002 Copyright © 2002 Sheffield Academic Press Published by Sheffield Academic Press Ltd Mansion House, 19 Kingfield Road Sheffield S1 1 9AS, UK ISBN 1–84127–223–X Published in the U.S.A. and Canada (only) by CRC Press LLC 2000 Corporate Blvd., N.W. Boca Raton, FL 33431, U.S.A. Orders from the U.S.A. and Canada (only) to CRC Press LLC U.S.A. and Canada only: ISBN 0-8493-9782-0 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner. This book contains information obtained from authentic and highly regarded sources. Reprinted material is quoted with permission, and sources are indicated. Reasonable efforts have been made to publish reliable data and information, but the author and the publisher cannot assume responsibility for the validity of all materials or for the consequences of their use. Trademark Notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation, without intent to infringe. Printed on acid-free paper in Great Britain by Antony Rowe Ltd., Chippenham, Wiltshire British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data: A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data: A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress

Preface Enzymes may be described as 'functional catalytic proteins'. I do hope, however, that this volume will re-introduce them as useful and targeted workforces. Like the more familiar human workforces, they have preferred working conditions, may be trained (cultured) to carry out very specific tasks, and they cannot function when their food (substrate) runs out. The purpose of this volume is to provide both a basic grounding, for those not experienced in the use of enzymes, and a state-of-the-art account of today's enzyme technology as applied to food and drink. Authors have been selected not only for their practical, working knowledge of enzymes but also for their infectious enthusiasm for the subject. Enzymes are introduced first according to their nomenclature and then by their nature and mode of action. Chapters go on to describe the basic theory and practical applications of exogenous enzymes in food and drink technology, and how enzymes improve raw materials and influence and modify the biochemical and physical events that we describe as 'food processing'. Finally, methods of culturing and manufacturing enzymes in commercial quantities are described, together with the role that genetic engineering has to play in their further development. Indigenous enzymes in food raw materials have long played a role in food production. Today, however, enzymologists, working together with food development technologists and with a view to market requirements, have helped and improved upon nature to bring us varieties of food and drink that were unheard of a relatively short time ago. Examples of these are wines which mature earlier and have enhanced aroma and colour stability, 'naked' but undamaged citrus fruit (devoid of its pith or peel), bread that resists staling, and enzyme-modified cheeses. Furthermore, production yields and purities of intermediate raw materials have been improved, and by-products, previously thought of as waste, may now be utilised. My thanks to all the contributors to this book for sharing their practical approach to the subject. I hope that the reader finds the volume as rewarding as I found its preparation. R. J. Whitehurst B. A. Law

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Contributors Ms Rose-Marie Canal-Llauberes Novozymes, Cite Mondiale, 23 Parvis des Chartrons, F-33074 Bordeaux Cedex, France Mrs Cornelia Drost-Lustenberger Novozymes Switzerland AG, Neumatt, 4243 Dittingen, Switzerland Dr Pierre Fauquembergue

DSM Food Specialties, 20 rue du Ballon, 59041 Lille Cedex, France

Mr Mari J. M. C. van Gestel

PB 28, Quest International, PO Box 2, 1400 CA Buss, The Netherlands

Dr Catherine Grassin


Professor Barry A. Law

Food Science Australia, Sneydes Road, Private Bag 16, Werribee, Victoria 3030, Australia

Mr Per Munk Nielsen

Novozymes A/S, Laurentsvej 55, DK2880 Bagsvaerd, Denmark

Mr Hans Sejr Olsen

Novozymes A/S, CLaurentsvej 55, DK2880 Bagsvaerd, Denmark

Mr Maarten van Oort

Novozymes, Biltseveste 12, 3432 AR Nieuwegein, The Netherlands

Mr Richie Piggott

Quest International, 5115 Sedge Blvd., Hoffman Estates, Illinois 60192, USA

Ms Joan Qi Si

Novozymes SA, 79 Avenue Frangois Arajo, 92017 Nanterre Cedex, France

Mr Diederik J. M. Schmedding


Mr Reinhold Urlaub

Rohm Enzyme Gmbh, Kirschenallee 45, D-64293 Darmstadt, Germany

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The nature of enzymes and their action in foods BARRY A. LAW 1.1 Introduction 1.2 Enzymes in food 1.2.1 Enzyme nomenclature 1.2.2 Enzyme kinetics 1.2.3 Enzyme (in)stability 1.2.4 Composition and activity of commercial enzyme preparations 1.3 Sources and range of enzymes for food technology 1.4 Food enzyme legislation 1.5 Modification of food enzyme activity by protein engineering 1.6 Summary and conclusions References

1 ! 2 2 3 6 8 9 14 16 18 18

Enzymes for bread, pasta and noodle products JOAN QI SI and CORNELIA DROST-LUSTENBERGER


2.1 2.2

Introduction Bread 2.2.1 Fungal a/p/za-amylases 2.2.2 Amylases to extend shelf life 2.2.3 Xylanases/pentosanases/hemicellulases 2.2.4 Lipase 2.2.5 Oxidases 2.2.6 Synergistic effects of enzymes 2.2.7 Enzymes for frozen dough and part-baked bead 2.3 Enzymes for Asian noodles and non-durum pasta 2.3.1 Reducing speckiness 2.3.2 Increasing brightness and colour stability 2.3.3 Improving texture 2.3.4 Mechanisms for the effect of lipase Acknowledgement References

19 19 20 21 28 31 33 34 39 46 46 46 48 51 54 54

Enzymes in brewing DIEDERIK J. M. SCHMEDDING and MARI J. M. C. van GESTEL


3.1 Introduction 3.1.1 History of brewing 3.2 Raw materials

CONTENTS 3.2.1 Malt and adjuncts 3.2.2 Hops 3.2.3 Yeast 3.2.4 Water 3.2.5 Exogenous enzymes as processing aids 3.3 The processes of malting and brewing 3.3.1 The malting process 3.3.2 Malt specification 3.3.3 The brewing process 3.4 Enzymes in the brewing process 3.4.1 Enzymes in malting 3.4.2 Enzymes in mashing 3.4.3 Enzymes in adjunct cooking 3.4.4 Enzymes in lautering/mash 3.4.5 Enzymes in fermentation 3.4.6 Enzymes in maturation 3.4.7 Chill proofing enzymes 3.4.8 Future developments Acknowledgements Further reading


58 59 59 59 59 60 61 61 62 64 64 66 70 70 71 73 73 74 75 75

Enzymes in wine production MAARTEN van OORT and ROSE-MARIE CANAL-LLAUBERES


4.1 Introduction 4.2 Legal aspects of the use of enzymes in winemaking 4.2.1 Recommendations from international organisations 4.3 Enzymes in winemaking: history and definitions 4.4 Enzyme properties and composition 4.5 Applications of enzymes 4.5.1 Enzymes for pressing and maceration 4.6 Enzyme applications for white and pink wine grape varieties 4.7 Enzyme applications for red wine grape varieties 4.8 Enzyme applications for must and press wines: clarification enzymes 4.9 Enzyme applications for young wines: maturation and filtration enzymes 4.10 Enzyme preparations for aroma liberation 4.11 Enzymes for colour extraction 4.12 Other enzymes used in winemaking 4.12.1 Urease 4.12.2 Lysozyme 4.13 New developments 4.13.1 Cork cleaning 4.13.2 Colour stabilisation 4.13.3 Health issues 4.14 Conclusions References

76 76 77 77 78 79 80 81 83 83 84 85 87 87 87 88 88 88 88 89 89 89



Enzymes in the manufacture of dairy products BARRY A. LAW


Introduction Milk-clotting enzymes 5.2.1 The nature and identity of rennets and coagulants 5.2.2 Main characteristics of rennets and coagulants from different sources 5.2.3 Production of rennets and coagulants 5.2.4 Formulation and standardisation of rennets and coagulants 5.3 Lactoperoxidase 5.4 Cheese ripening enzymes 5.4. i Types of enzymes available commercially 5.4.2 Enzyme addition technology 5.4.3 Enzyme-modified cheese (EMC) technology 5.5 Lysozyme 5.6 Transglutaminase 5.7 Lipase 5.7.1 Lipolysed milk fat (LMF) 5.7.2 Lipase-catalysed intra- and intermolecular modification of milk fat 5.8 Lactase 5.8.1 Commercial dairy products of lactase technology References

90 90 91 92 95 96 96 97 97 99 101 103 104 104 104 105 105 107 107

Enzymic modification of food protein PER MUNK NIELSEN and HANS SEJR OLSEN 6.1 Introduction 6.2 Industrial proteases 6.3 Protein hydrolysis in enzyme applications 6.3.1 Control of hydrolysis reaction 6.3.2 Calculation of the degree of hydrolysis of proteins using the pH-stat technique 6.3.3 Calculation of the degree of hydrolysis of proteins using the osmometry technique 6.3.4 Some kinetic aspects of protein hydrolysis 6.3.5 The effect of proteolysis 6.4 The bitterness problem 6.4.1 Other off-flavour problems related to bitterness 6.5 Protein hydrolysis for food processing 6.5.1 Inactivation of enzyme activity and downstream processing 6.6 Functional protein hydrolysates 6.7 Low allergenic peptides for baby food formulae 6.8 Meat extracts 6.9 Bone cleaning 6.9.1 Hydrolysis of meat protein in relation to bone cleaning 6.10 Enzymatic tenderisation of meat 6.11 Modification of wheat gluten 6.12 Use of membranes in protein hydrolysis processes 6.12.1 Functional protein hydrolysates 6.12.2 Low molecular weight hydrolysates 6.12.3 The membrane reactor

109 109 109 110 11 1 1 12 114 114 116 1 17 118 119 120 122 124 ! 25 127 127 129 130 131 131 132 133


CONTENTS 6.13 Flavour enhancers 6.13.1 Production of flavour enhancers 6.13.2 Enzymatically hydrolysed vegetable proteins (e-HVP) 6.13.3 Hydrolysed animal proteins (e-HVP) 6.14 Yeast extracts 6.15 Fish processes 6.16 Protein cross-linking in food processing 6.16.1 Applications of transglutaminase References


134 134 135 135 136 137 138 139 140

Enzymes in fruit and vegetable juice extraction REINHOLD URLAUB


7.1 7.2 7.3 7.4

144 145 146 147 148 149 150 151 153 154 155 157 158 159 160 161 165 166 167 168 168 169 170 172 172 173 175 176 177 178 179 181 182 182

Introduction The legal situation Definitions and characteristics Pectins 7.4.1 Smooth-region pectinases 7.4.2 Hairy-region pectinases 7.5 Cellulose and hemicellulose 7.6 Starch 7.7 Protein 7.8 Application of technical enzyme products 7.9 Pome fruit processing 7.9.1 Enzymatic treatment of the mash 7.9.2 Pomace extraction 7.9.3 Maceration 7.9.4 Pomace maceration 7.9.5 Juice treatment 7.9.6 Traditional clarification and filtration 7.9.7 Ultrafiltration of apple juice 7.9.8 Cloudy apple juice or apple juice concentrate 7.10 Grapes 7.10.1 Processing of Concord grapes 7.10.2 Manufacturing white grape juice and grape juice concentrate 7.11 Berries 7.12 Stone fruit 7.13 Citrus fruit 7.13.1 WESOS 7.13.2 Citrus juice concentrates 7.13.3 Clear and semi-cloudy citrus concentrates 7.13.4 Extraction of citrus oil 7.13.5 Cloudifier 7.14 Tropical fruit 7.15 Vegetables 7.16 Membrane cleaning References



Enzymes in fruit processing CATHERINE GRASSIN and PIERRE FAUQUEMBERGUE 8.1 Citrus peeling 8.2 Citrus peel processing 8.3 Fruit 8.3.1 Strawberries 8.3.2 Tomato References



Enzymes in starch modification HANS SEJR OLSEN 9.1 Introduction 9.2 Processing and enzymology 9.2.1 Starch liquefaction 9.2.2 tf/pte-Amylases 9.2.3 Saccharification of liquefied starch 9.2.4 Tailor-made glucose syrups 9.2.5 Use of syrups 9.2.6 Production of maltose syrups 9.2.7 DX, DE and reducing value 9.2.8 High conversion syrup 9.2.9 Production of high dextrose syrups 9.2. i 0 Amyloglucosidase/pullulanus combination in the production of high dextrose syrup 9.2.11 Continuous saccharification 9.2.12 Continuous saccharification in a membrane reactor 9.3 Enzymes as processing aids in the purification of saccharified wheat starch 9.4 Glucose isomerisation 9.4.1 The isomerisation reaction 9.4.2 Isomerisation conditions 9.4.3 Isomerisation temperature 9.4.4 Isomerisation pH 9.4.5 Isomerisation glucose (dextrose-DX) and fructose concentration 9.4.6 The immobilised enzyme system 9.4.7 Process lay-out 9.4.8 Enzyme decay 9.4.9 Controlling isomerisation costs 9.5 Use of high-fructose corn syrups (MFCS) 9.6 Cyclodextrins 9.7 The future 9.8 Conclusion References

10 Commercial enzyme production and genetic modification of source organisms RICHIE PIGGOTT 10.1 Brief history 10.2 Sources of commercial enzymes


184 184 186 187 194 196 199

200 200 201 201 204 210 210 211 213 213 214 215 216 217 218 218 219 219 220 220 220 221 221 222 224 224 225 226 227 227 228

229 229 229


CONTENTS 10.2.1 Animal-derived enzymes 10.2.2 Plant-derived enzymes 10.3 Microbial enzyme fermentation 10.4 Preservation of industrial microorganisms 10.4.1 Freezing 10.4.2 Freeze-drying 10.4.3 Subculturing 10.5 Inoculum development 10.6 Submerged fermentation 10.7 Separation of broth 10.7.1 Filtration with filter aid 10.7.2 Microfiltration 10.7.3 Centrifugation 10.8 Concentration 10.9 Drying 10.10 Enzyme formulation 10.10.1 Powder blending 10.10.2 Liquid blending 10.11 Surface culture (Koji) fermentation 10.12 Intracellular enzyme production 10.13 Genetics of producer organisms Acknowledgements References


230 230 232 233 234 234 234 234 235 236 236 237 237 237 238 239 239 240 240 241 242 244 244



The nature of enzymes and their action in foods Barry A. Law






1.2 Enzymes in food 1.2.1

Enzyme nomenclature

Any particular enzyme only catalyses reactions between one type (or a narrow range) of chemical compound (its substrate). This defines its 'specificity' and provides the basis of its classification and name. Often, the trivial name of the enzyme, derived from the truncated substrate name with 'ase' added, identifies the substrate or substrate range better for food technologists than does its systematic name or its International Union of Biochemistry Enzyme Commission (IUB or EC) number [1]. For example, the trivial name for lipid-hydrolysing enzymes is lipase, but the official name and number is triacylglycerol acylhydrolase (IUB/EC The latter is precisely descriptive of what such enzymes do, and the term/number is vital for unambiguous communication between biochemists and product chemists. As far as food technologists are concerned though, lipases act on lipids and break them down to their component fatty acids and glycerol. This is the important information to be used in food product and process terms, and the trivial names of all food enzymes will be used throughout this chapter. Thus, proteinases (usually shortened to protease) chop up proteins by breaking the amide bonds that join their component amino acids into the protein polypeptide chain. Carbohydrates would logically be broken down by carbohydrases, though this is not a commonly used term, largely because carbohydrate building blocks are very diverse, as are the polymeric structures formed from them (the starches, cellulose, pectins). This diversity will become clearer to the reader as this volume unfolds. For now, suffice it to say that more useful general terms for members of this class of enzyme are derived from individual substrates. Thus lactase breaks down lactose, maltase breaks down maltose, pectinase breaks down pectin and cellulase breaks down cellulose. There is no 'starchase' because there are too many structural isomers of starch on which to base the obvious trivial name for starch degrading enzymes. The most ubiquitous 'starchase' is called alpha-amylase because it chops up the amylose component of starch at the most common glucose-to-glucose bond in the amylose polymer (alpha-l–4). Although the majority of enzymes (over 90%) used currently in commercial scale food technology are hydrolytic substrate degraders like those mentioned above, some enzymes used to improve and modify food materials catalyse synthetic reactions and substrate interconversions. Most are quite easy to identify with their biochemical function because their names describe the main substrate and the reaction; for example, glucose oxidase oxidises glucose to gluconic acid, using up oxygen. However, this name does not tell us much about the technological functions it performs, namely reducing glucose content of egg whites to reduce Maillard browning, and scavenging oxygen in packaging technology. There is nothing to be done about this, other than for the food technologist to be aware of the technological significance of glucose oxidation



by a nice gentle enzyme. Similarly, the names glucose isomerase or lipoxygenase tell all about the biochemistry involved, but we just have to remember the technology. The isomer of glucose produced by glucose (strictly, 'xylose') isomerase is fructose which, mole for mole, is sweeter than glucose so the enzyme is used to make the sweetener, high fructose corn syrup (section 1.3). The reactions catalysed by lipoxygenases used in bread improvement are quite complex [2] and not altogether understood by research biochemists. Fortunately, food technologists understand empirically that the enzyme catalyses reactions between lipids in flour and oxygen. Directly and indirectly these reactions bleach the flour and make nice white bread, and also modify wheat proteins so that they help in forming good crumb structure and high loaf volumes (chapter 2). Some enzymes are easier to identify with their food applications than others, but many of these connections between nomenclature and technological function will become familiar to the reader throughout this volume. 1.2.2 Enzyme kinetics The underlying mechanisms of enzyme action and the interactions of enzymes with their physical and chemical environment can be described mathematically with reasonable precision. However, most of the equations, constants and ground rules (enzyme kinetics) have been worked out for idealised situations in which single enzymes act on simple, single substrates under predictable conditions found within living cells. The reader who wants to understand these parameters in mathematical terms can find an excellent summary and reference list by Fullbrook [3] in 'Industrial Enzymology' [4]. In the same work, Fullbrook [5] also goes on to explain some of the pitfalls of applying 'classical' enzyme kinetics to non-ideal industrial processes. Food technologists not only need to know which enzymes degrade, synthesise or interconvert which food material substrates, but also need to have a means of working out how much of the chosen enzyme to use under any particular conditions to achieve an economical rate and efficiency of material conversion. Qualitative and quantitative enzyme kinetics show us that enzymes behave quite predictably in simple ideal systems such as those used to classify and characterise enzyme preparations in research and QA laboratories. They work at peak rates at particular pH values, temperatures and substrate concentrations according to well-established rules (figure 1.1). At fixed substrate concentrations, enzymic reaction rates depend on enzyme concentration up to a maximum, dependent on the turnover efficiency of the particular enzyme preparation. The 'activity curves' of the type shown diagramatically in figure 1.1 are used to derive the numerical values of these parameters, and they are vital basic inputs into deciding which enzyme preparation(s) should be used in which food modification process [3].




7 pH

Substrate concentration


20 30 40 Temperature (°C)

Enzyme concentration

Figure 1.1 Effect of pH, temperature, enzyme concentration and substrate concentration on the initial rate of enzyme catalysed reactions in solution.

The temperature and pH 'profiles' derived from simple test conditions are usually applicable to complex food environments because they are dependent on the molecular properties of the enzyme protein itself, rather than on those of the substrate. Enzyme proteins are precisely folded polypeptide chains, held together by relatively weak molecular forces. The folded structure determines the integrity of the catalytic site (the 'active site', figure 1.2) within the enzyme, and this is easily disrupted by energy changes in the enzyme's environment (temperature being a prime example). This phenomenon is called 'denaturation'

Figure 1.2 The three-dimensional folded polype-ptide chain of an enzyme protein, illustrating the interactions between active site functional groups (A and B) and substrate (C) which lower the energy needed to break the chemical bond in the substrate and thus create the catalytic activity of the enzyme.



and it can be reversible or irreversible dependent on the severity of structural deformation and damage. However, even small changes in intramolecular forces in the enzyme, such as those caused by small temperature changes, or pH-dependent charge differences on the amino acids making up the primary polypeptide chain structures, can also cause conformational changes in the structure that fall short of denaturation. Changes of this magnitude are manifested in the typical temperature and pH/activity curves in figure 1.1 and illustrate how precise the spatial juxtaposition of active site functional groups must be to reach the maximum rate of catalysis. Thus, as reaction temperature is increased, classical chemical kinetics dictate that the reaction will speed up, but beyond a certain temperature (characteristic of any particular enzyme) the disruption to the enzyme protein folded structure reduces its catalytic efficiency and activity tails off again. In the case of pH, the bell-shaped curve is the manifestation of an optimal spatial structure of the enzyme protein which forms at a certain pH, when the relative ionisations within the structure combine to orientate the active site to give maximum substrate binding, bond modification, and release of product. Either side of the optimum pH for activity, changes in charge and hydrogen bonding efficiency can either distort the active site through changes in the threedimensional fold of the protein polypeptide chain (figure 1.2), or reduce bond dipoles in active site functional groups, reducing their capacity to lower the activation energy for conversion of the substrate(s). The understanding of the relationships between the amino acid sequences, three-dimensional structures and catalytic efficiencies of food enzymes is now sufficiently comprehensive to allow molecular enzymologists to change the structures of food enzymes to improve their technological processing properties such as heat resistance, pH optimum, resistance to catalytic poisons/inhibitors and even substrate preference. This is called 'protein engineering', and is reviewed by Goodenough [6] and Law [7] specifically in relation to the advantageous modification of enzymes for food ingredients synthesis. Other examples appear later in section 1.5. 1.2.3 Enzyme (in)stability Enzymes have a finite working life, or half-life, due to inherent physical instability, the action of antagonists/inhibitors, and 'poisoning' by contaminants in the reaction mixture. In foods and food technology, physical instability can be induced by the pH and temperature effects outlined above, but also by relatively mild forces such as surface tension in foams and emulsions. Most enzyme inhibitors would not be present in foods because they are generally poisonous (e.g. heavy metals and organometallic compounds), but many enzyme antagonists and catalytic poisons are common in foods and food raw materials (e.g. respectively, proteolytic enzymes and free radicals from oxidised



unsaturated fatty acids). Enzyme instability measured for purified proteins in aqueous buffers can give guidance to technologists as to the comparative stability of rival enzyme preparations under real processing conditions, but absolute stability can only be determined in real food systems. The first decision to make is whether the process will benefit from stable or unstable enzymes. Highly stable enzymes are normally used in processes that take a long time to complete, such as malting and Koji fermentations, or where the enzyme is part of a diagnostic kit, and has to survive drying and long storage before use, without losing its standardised activity at manufacture. On the other hand, some enzymes used in food manufacture are only required to be active for a short time to scavenge oxygen, to precipitate milk proteins or to assist ripening for example, and their long-term persistence in the food is either irrelevant, or even detrimental. Specific examples of these applied scenarios and the criteria used to pick the right enzyme for the job will emerge in the following chapters. Some of the special factors that influence the stability and half-life of enzymes in food systems and food processing are listed in table 1.1. There are no hard and fast rules to guide food technologists through this largely unexplored area of applied enzyme science because the research community has not systematically studied the effects of phase structures and interfaces in food on all of the factors used to predict enzyme activity. However, based on table 1.1, it may be possible to avoid some pitfalls, or even exploit some

Table 1.1 Special factors that influence the stability of enzymes in food Condition

Effect on stability

Underlying cause

Phase concentration of enzyme


Increased energy per unit volume required to denature enzyme

Presence of other non-enzyme proteins


Lowers proportion of denaturing energy or molecular source available to denature enzyme protein

Presence of other enzyme proteins


If accompanying enzymes or proteinases, they may degrade the added enzyme protein

Presence of impurities


Catalytic poisoning • of lipases by free radical-induced chemical damage to the enzyme (especially lipases) • of any enzyme by heavy metal atoms blocking the active site • of metal requiring enzymes by chelating agents such as citric acid or polyphosphates

Phase interfaces


Denaturation by surface tension forces



opportunities. For example, a supplier might recommend an enzyme addition rate of x units per kilogram of food product, based on the activity measured against the substrate in solution. The food manufacturer calculates the cost of the enzymatic conversion based on this figure, adjusts it to compensate for differences in pH and temperature, and decides how much the enzymatic stage will cost. This decision process is based on the assumption that the enzyme will be acting in a homogeneous environment similar to that under which the producer assayed it. However, most foods are heterogeneous, consisting of discontinuous solid composites of fat, protein, carbohydrates and water, or emulsions and foams with distinct phase boundaries. Such structures in food tend to cause any added substance to be concentrated by affinity, osmosis or differential solubility into one particular component or phase of the food. It is therefore worth seeking from the supplier data on the solubility, hydrophobicity and resistance to surface tension denaturation of the enzyme, so that the costing figures can be adjusted to '.v units per kg bulk protein, fat or carbohydrate', or even 'per unit volume of water in an emulsion'. This might produce a cost figure substantially more or less than that based on assumptions of homogeneity. 1.2.4 Composition and activity of commercial enzyme preparations Most commercial enzyme preparations contain not only the specific enzyme whose activity is printed on the label, but also other enzymes that happen to be produced by the same source material/organism [8]. The enzyme user must always be aware of this factor in the enzyme product specification to avoid side effects in complex foods (e.g. starch breakdown by an enzyme preparation bought for its proteinase function). Even if the application is for an isolated food component such as whey protein, a heterogeneous enzyme preparation can pass unexpected and unwanted enzyme activities on to the customer who buys the enzyme-modified food ingredient unless steps are taken to inactivate it after processing. Thus, enzyme/substrate interrelationships are more complex and less predictable in food reaction environments because food materials are not pure chemicals, but complex structures and/or poorly defined mixtures of potential (possibly competing) substrates and inhibitors. The amount of enzyme required to convert a given amount of substrate is measured in 'Enzyme Units'. In simple systems the original International Union of Biochemistry Unit (U) was the 'amount of enzyme that will catalyse the transformation of one micromole of substrate per minute under defined conditions'. The SI unit for enzyme activity is the 'katal'. defined as the 'amount of enzyme that will cause the transformation of one millimole of substrate per second under specified conditions'. Unfortunately for food technologists, even a substrate that is definable in food technology terms (e.g. fungal protein, vegetable protein extracts, animal



muscle, com starch, milk fat) is heterogeneous as far as an enzyme is concerned, and the above unit definitions are of little use to them in process design. For example, corn starch consists of glucose polymers of infinitely-variable molecular weight with huge batch-to-batch differences, rendering impossible any fixed standard enzyme dose to achieve an agreed specification for a hydrolysed starch ingredient product. Indeed, it would be impossible to define an enzyme unit in relation to such a substrate simply because a millimole or micromole of a mixed molecular weight polymer cannot be defined. These factors mean that there is no simple, consistent way to define or pre-determine how much enzyme to add to how much raw material in food processing. In practice, enzyme suppliers provide essential information for their customers by defining units in terms of the technological function of the enzyme. This not only allows the user to define and control the enzymatic process on an industrial scale, but sets out the basis for relating the cost of the enzyme to the value of the product produced, and allows comparison of the productivity of enzymes from different suppliers. A good example of such a pragmatic and direct approach to quantifying enzymes for sale and dosing is the use of 'international milk clotting units' (IMCU) for quantifying milk-coagulating enzymes (chymosin, microbial rennets) for sale and use in cheesemaking. The enzymes are all acid proteinases that degrade caseins, but casein breakdown itself is not usefully related to the technological function of destabilising casein micelles and causing milk to clot. The IMCU is a measure of the ability of acid proteinases, sold as cheese milk coagulants, to clot a standard amount of milk under standard conditions in a standard time relative to an international enzyme reference standard [8]. Other function-based units of food processing enzyme activity are based on such parameters as viscosity (reduction or increase), conductivity and colour binding. 1.3 Sources and range of enzymes for food technology The traditional sources of food technology enzymes have been the tissues of plants and animals (table 1.2). Although these are still widely used in food manufacture, there are many influences driving food enzyme production and use towards microbial alternatives, including genetically-modified derivatives of these organisms (GMOs). There are many examples of the use of carbohydrate-degrading enzymes in food manufacture, particularly in baking, beer brewing and fruit juice production, and these will be covered in detail in chapters 2, 3 and 7 of this volume. However, their economical production from efficient microorganisms in industrial-scale fermenters means that the utilisation of the enzymes such as amylase and pectinase present in the traditional raw materials (wheat, barley, citrus fruits, flour) is confined now to their action in situ, and they are not widely extracted for exogenous use.



Table 1.2 Enzymes widely sourced from animals and plants used in food manufacturing technology Enzyme


Action in food

Food applications

alpha- Amylase

Cereal seeds e.g. wheat, barley

Starch hydrolysis to oligosaccharides

Breadmaking brewing (malting)


Sweet potato

Starch hydrolysis to maltose

Production of high malt syrups


Latex of unripe papaya fruit

Food and beverage protein hydrolysis

Meat tenderisation chill haze prevention in beer


Pineapple juice and stem

Muscle and connective tissue protein hydrolysis

Meat tenderisation


Fig fruit latex

As bromelain

As bromelain and papain but not widely used due to cost


Bovine/porcine pancreas

Food protein hydrolysis

Production of hydrolysates for food flavouring (mostly replaced now by microbial proteinases)

Chymosin (rennet)

Calf abomasum



Coagulation of milk in cheesemaking

Bovine abomasum

As chymosin + more general casein hydrolysis in cheese

Usually present with chymosin as pan of 'rennet'


Gullet of goat and lamb: calf abomasum: pig pancreas

Triglyceride (fat) hvdrolvsis

Flavour enhancement in cheese products: fat function modification by interesterification


Soy bean

Oxidation of unsaturated fatty acids in flour

Bread dough improvement


Hen egg white

Hydrolysis of bacterial cell wall polysaccharides

Prevention of late blowing defects in cheese by spore-forming bacteria


Cheese whey: bovine colostrum

Oxidation of thiocyanate ion to bactericidal hypothiocyanate

Cold sterilisation of milk

Certain plant and animal proteinases, on the other hand, remain in widespread use through their well-established effectiveness in some fundamental processes in cheese production and meat processing (chapters 5 and 6). Of particular note are papain (and the related proteinases bromelain and ficin) in meat



tenderisation, and chymosin (with a little pepsin for good measure) in the milk coagulation stage of cheesemaking. Chymosin extracted from calf offal has been displaced in some countries by the same enzyme produced by fermentation of yeasts and fungi containing cloned chymosin genes (chapter 5), but it is still the preferred choice of many traditional cheesemakers, despite the supply and purity advantages of the fermentation-produced product. Bovine and porcine trypsin are still used for producing food protein hydrolysates as food flavour ingredients, but there are so many good microbial alternatives to these classical serine proteinases now on the market (table 1.3), especially those with less tendency to make bitter products, that trypsin is no longer as important to food manufacturers. Like proteinases, the food grade animal lipases that have been the mainstay of the dairy flavours industry in the past (chapter 5) are gradually being replaced by equivalent enzymes of microbial origin. This is especially the case in the newer technologies such as fat function modification by enzymatic interesterification [10] in which complex and interdependent enzyme reactors put new demands on long-term enzyme stability, catalytic efficiency, compatibility with multi-step processes and resistance to poisoning by impurities in commodity food fats. However, some 'traditional' applications remain, particularly in the production of piquant-flavoured Italian cheese varieties (chapter 5). Soy and wheat lipoxygenase is an important enzyme in bread baking (chapter 2) and has traditionally been used in the form of the endogenous wheat flour enzyme, supplemented with soy flour. The latter not only adds to the lipoxygenase activity in the dough, but also supplies lipid substrates to both enzyme sources to improve the texture, 'workability' and colour of bread dough, through (probably) sulfhydryl group oxidation in wheat proteins, and oxidative bleaching of plant pigments. Lysozyme and lactoperoxidase are both animal enzymes extracted from natural sources (table 1.2), but they differ in their application from most animal and plant enzymes in that they are both antimicrobial, and can be used to control different types of spoilage in cheese and milk (chapter 5). More and more enzymes for food technology are now derived from specially selected or genetically modified microorganisms grown in industrial scale fermenters (chapter 10) and table 1.3 lists a range of examples and applications. The number and range of these examples of microbially sourced alternatives reflect the logistical and commercial advantages of using microbial fermentation rather than animal or plant extraction to produce food enzymes. Logistics are based on both political geography and transportation costs; clearly it is desirable for an enzyme producer and user to have a reliable, predictable source of an enzyme that is pivotal for a manufacturing process. This rule holds good for quantity, quality and price, and the fermentation alternative delivers on all counts. It can be produced anywhere in the world, irrespective of climate and agro-economics, the enzyme yield is predictable from the fermentation

Table 1.3 Enzymes derived from microorganisms and used in food manufacturing technology Enz.yme


Action in food

Application in food technology


Axpergillux spp. Bacillus spp.* Micmhacterium irnperiale

Wheat starch hydrolysis

Dough softening, increased bread volume, aid production of sugars for yeast fermentation

alpha- Acetoluctute decarboxylase

Bacillus subtilis*

Converts acetolactate to acetoin

Reduction of wine maturation time by circumventing need for secondary fermentation of diacetyl to acetoin


Axpergillux niger Rhizopux spp.

Hydrolyses starch dextrins to glucose (saccharitication)

One stage of high fructose corn syrup production; production of Mite' beers


Lcictococcus lactix Axpergillux spp. Rhizopux oryzae

Releases free amino acids from N-terminus of proteins and peptides

De-bittering protein hydrolysates accelerating cheese maturation


Aspergillux niger* Micrococcux lute us

Breaks down hydrogen peroxide to water and oxygen

Oxygen removal technology, combined with glucose oxidase


Axpergillux niger Trichodernw spp.

Hydrolyses cellulose

Fruit liquifaction in juice production


Axpergillux awtunori* Kluyvemmycex lactix*

Hydrolyses kappa-casein

Coagulation of milk for cheeseinaking

Cyclodextrin glucanotransferase

Bacillus spp.*

Synthesise cyclodextrins from liquified starch

Cyclodextrins are food-grade micro-encapsulants for colours, flavours and vitamins

beta-Galactosidase (lactase)

Axpergillux spp. Kluyvennnvcex spp.

Hydrolyses milk lactose to glucose and galactose

Sweetening milk and whey; products for lactose-intolerant individuals; reduction of crystallisation in ice cream containing whey; improving functionality of whey protein concentrates; manufacture of lactulose


Aspergilltix spp. Bacillus xuhtilix*

Hydrolyses beta-glucans in beer mashes

Filtration aids, haze prevention in beer production

Glucose isomerase

Actinplani's missouriensis Bacillus coagulanst Streptomyces lividanx* Streptomyces rubiginosus

Converts glucose to fructose

Production of high fructose corn syrup (beverage sweetener)

Glucose oxidase

Aspergillus niger* Penicillium chrysogenum

Oxidises glucose to gluconic acid

Oxygen removal from food packaging; removal of glucose from egg white to prevent browning

Hemicellulase and xylanase

Aspergillus spp.* Bacillus subtilis* Trichoderma reesei*

Hydrolyses hemicelluloses (insoluble non-starch polysaccharides in flour)

Bread improvement through improved crumb structure

Lipase and esterase

Aspergillus spp.* Candida spp. Rhizomucor miehei Penicillium roqueforti Rhizopus spp. Bacillus subtilis*

Hydrolyses triglycerides to fatty acids and glycerol; hydrolyses alkyl esters to fatty acids and alcohol

Flavour enhancement in cheese products; fat function modification by interesterification; synthesis of flavour esters

Pectinase (polygalacturonase)

Aspergillus spp. Penicillium funiculosum

Hydrolyses pectin

Clarification of fruit juices by depectinisation


Aspergillus spp.*

Removes methyl groups from galacose units in pectin

With pectinase in depectinisation technology


Humicola insolens Trichoderma reesei

Hydrolyses pentosans (soluble non-starch polysaccharides in wheat flours)

Part of bread dough improvement technology


Bacillus spp.* Klebsiella spp.*

Hydrolyses 1 -6 bonds that form 'branches' in starch structure

Starch saccharification (improves efficiency)

Protease (proteinase)

Aspergillus spp.* Rhizomucor miehei Cryphonectria parasitica Penicillium citrinum Rhizopus niveus Bacillus spp.*

Hydrolysis of kappa-casein; hydrolysis of animal and vegetable food proteins; hydrolysis of wheat glutens

Milk coagulation for cheesemaking; hydrolysate production for soups and savoury foods; bread dough improvement

*These enzymes are commercially available from GMO versions of the source microorganism.



parameters, and the purity is guaranteed by both the fermentation specification and the downstream processing technology. Also, the fermentation source completely avoids problems posed by the threat of the spread of diseases in the plant and animal population. Nothing illustrates these points better than the use of food-grade microorganisms to make chymosin, the cheese milk coagulant. This topic is dealt with in detail in chapter 5, so a summary will suffice here. Chymosin is an acid proteinase that is traditionally a by-product of the milk and veal industry. It is extracted as 'rennet' from the calf abomasum after slaughter, and ideally has a high ratio of chymosin to pepsin, the adult bovine acid proteinase. Even before the spread of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) and its human form CJD, the supply of calf offal from the meat industry was unpredictable, and insufficient to match the demands of the global cheese industry. Now the supply situation is even worse, and unlikely to recover in the forseeable future. Fortunately the shortfall can be made up through the supply and use of microbial alternatives produced by the growing food enzyme industry. These alternatives range from fungal acid proteinases (mainly from Rhizomucor miehei) to calf chymosin produced by gene cloning technology so that the identical calf enzyme can be produced by fermenting food yeast or mould under strictly controlled conditions. The following chapters of this volume describe and discuss many more examples of the application of microbial food enzymes in the commodity sectors of the food manufacturing and processing industry. Indeed, the availability and use of microbial enzymes is so widespread that a considerable body of national legislation has emerged and matured to ensure environmental and consumer safety. This is true of enzymes derived from both GM and non-GM microorganisms.


Food enzyme legislation

The following is a summary only to complete this overview of the special considerations attached to the use of enzymes in food technology. In food enzyme legislation, most enzymes are regarded as processing aids because they are added during processing for technical reasons, and have no function in the food itself. Additives have a definite function in the food product, such as preservation, antioxidation, colouring, flavouring or stabilisation. There are grey areas, of course, most notably in the case of egg white lysozyme in cheese, where it continues to inhibit gas-forming bacteria up to the time of consumption. However, the majority of food enzyme applications are as processing aids, and they are often denatured by heat during processing. Food enzymes are regulated in the UK and European Union (EU) member states by permitted list. For an enzyme to be on the list it must pass stringent



testing to prove absence of toxins, allergens, heavy metals, pathogenic microorganisms and other hazardous contaminants, as specified by the WHO/FAO Joint Expert Committee for Food Additives (JECFA). Thus, although enzymes are not by definition food additives, they are treated as such for scrutiny before going into the Permitted List. Thereafter they 'become' processing aids and need not be labelled (unless the source organism is a GMO—see below). US legislation and regulation of food enzymes is based on safety in use, whatever the source, and relies heavily on the concept of 'Generally Regarded as Safe' (GRAS) status for additives, ingredients and their sources. UK and EU Food Law is harmonised for additives by Directives and Regulations which must become Statute Law in Member States, but not for processing aids. This can lead to differences, not in the rigour of safety regulation, but in the need to label foods. US and EU Law is not harmonised at all and enzyme applications in food must be handled on a case-by-case basis. Although there is a Permitted List of food enzymes that specifies origin, application field and attests to safety, this does not permit an existing enzyme preparation on the list to be used if it has been sourced from a new organism, or by a new production process, or if it is to be used in a novel food process. In the UK, all such intended new sources and processes must be referred to the Advisory Committee on Novel Foods and Processes (ACNFP); the European Commission (EC) operates an equivalent system of approval. ACNFP was formerly an advisory body to the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (MAFF) that was consulted by the industry on a voluntary basis, but its increasing role in regulating GMOs and their products has led to it becoming a statutory body within the new Food Standards Agency (FSA). Clearance from ACNFP is necessary before any new food enzyme/enzymatic process (GM or non-GM) can be brought to market within general Food Law. ACNFP operates a system of decision trees that lead to sets of information/testing requirements which the would-be producer or user of the enzyme must provide/carry out before ACNFP will consider the case for commercial application to food. This ACNFP system is the basis of new EU legislation placing the same stringent requirements on proposed new uses of enzymes in EU Member States [Regulation (EC) No. 258/97 on Novel Foods and Novel Food Ingredients]. It also incorporates specific information systems, checks and rules to regulate the introduction of enzymes from GMOs into foods. For the purposes of EU Food Law, a GMO is 'an organism, capable of replicating or transferring genetic material, in which the genetic material has been altered in a way that does not happen naturally by mating and/or natural recombination'. This is a very comprehensive definition, and it is important to note that there are now many methods available for constructing GMOs that either do not use any DNA 'foreign' to the host organism, or use methods that produce a final construct that contains no unnatural mutations. As such, these are inherently as safe as their wild-type equivalents but must, under EU



regulations, be regarded as GMOs in the same way as those constructs that contain 'foreign' genes (e.g. maize and soy resistant to weedkiller and rot-proof tomatoes). Such organisms and enzymes produced from them would have to be referred to ACNFP (or equivalent), but would not necessarily have to appear on the food label. In the US, the type of genetic modifications described above would not result in GMO classification, and would only require normal proof of safety in use. All GMO-derived food enzymes that pass scrutiny by ACNFP and equivalent must also pass the stringent safety tests and regulations required by JECFA.

1.5 Modification of food enzyme activity by protein engineering Just as basic and applied research in enzymology has brought about GMO technology to improve the range, reliability and purity of food enzymes, it has also made available the technology of enzyme protein engineering. The principles involved in protein engineering as they specifically relate to food enzymes are comprehensively discussed by Goodenough [6] and need not be repeated here. Suffice it to say that protein engineering is a knowledge-based method of changing the forces and interactions within the three-dimensional structure of an enzyme protein by directed changes to its amino acid sequence through manipulation of the gene controlling its production in the source organism. The aim is to alter the 'technological properties' of the enzyme to make it more or less stable, change its optimum operating range, or change its substrate converting range (specificity). Because this technology can alter the fundamental properties of naturally occurring enzyme proteins, regulators and enzyme producers alike are not yet considering food applications through which consumers would eat or be exposed to these novel materials. As safety assurance and surveillance methods become more sophisticated, the benefits of the technology may be fully realised, but for the present, engineered enzymes are only use in non-food applications and in one specific food ingredient technology involving tightly-immobilised enzymes in a bioreactor. This is the well-established process for sequentially converting corn (maize) starch to dextrins, glucose, and finally fructose, to produce a sweet syrup (high-fructose corn syrup, HFCS) that is used extensively in carbonated soft drinks [11,12]. The key enzyme in this process is xylose isomerase (also known as glucose isomerase within the industry). It is immobilised and used in a packed column reactor as the final processing stage in which the glucose released by starch saccharification is isomerised to fructose. The conditions under which the native microbial xylose isomerase is used in the complete process are set by a compromise between the optimum reaction temperature for enzymatic isomerisation, and the rate of enzyme denaturation as a result of destabilisation



of the folded (quarternary) structure of the enzyme protein. The active site of the enzyme is formed through a molecular association of protein monomers held together by interracial hydrogen bonding and salt bridges (figure 1,3). The process-limiting inactivation of xylose isomerase involves destabilisation of this molecular association through the chemical glycosylation of lysine epsilonamino groups that mediate the molecular association. The glycosylation happens quite quickly because the enzyme reactor temperature is relatively high, and starch-derived glucose is present at high concentrations to react with the amino groups. Redesign engineering strategies, based on computer graphics-aided protein engineering, identified a particular lysine residue (253) at the interface of three of the glucose isomerase monomers (A, B and D; figure 1.3) which, when substituted with arginine through site-directed mutagenesis, reduced the rate of amino group glycosylation, maintained the spatial orientation of position 253 in the quarternary structure, and created a new stabilising hydrogen bond between the monomers [13]. The practical result of the engineering exercise has been the creation of a new catalytically-active xylose isomerase which is not only more stable in solution at 60–70°C, but less susceptible to glycosylation by glucose at the elevated operating temperature. The 'new' enzyme has a volumetric half-life at 60°C of 1550h over a 10 week test period, whereas the equivalent value for wild-type xylose isomerase is 607 h.

Image Not Available

Figure 1.3 The effects of replacing lysine residue 253 in the amino acid sequence of a monomer of Actinoplanes missouriensis xylose isomerase by an arginine residue. Bold lines represent the carbon skeleton of lysine 253 (dashed) in the wild-type enzyme, and the replacement arginine (solid) in the mutated enzyme. The other amino acids and their sequence numbers are merely representations of their approximate positions near the monomer boundaries of protein monomers A, C and D. Hydrogen bond interactions are indicated by dotted lines between the monomer boundary interfaces. Reproduced with permission of Society of Chemical Industry.



1.6 Summary and conclusions The food manufacturing and ingredients industry makes widespread use of enzymes in both traditional sectors such as baking, brewing and cheesemaking, but also in new areas such as fat modification and sweetener technology. A degree of care and ingenuity is often needed to adapt these fragile biological catalysts to industrial processes, but a combination of basic biochemical knowledge and modern biotechnology is opening up new areas of application, especially for enzymes of microbial origin, and animal enzymes produced in microbes by genetic engineering technology. References 1. Dixon, M.. Webb, E.G. Enzymes. London: Longman; 1979. 2. Wong, W.S. Food Enzymes. Structure and Function. New York: Chapman & Hall: 1995. 3. Fullbrook, P.D. Practical applied kinetics. In: Godfrey, T., West, S. (eds). Industrial Enzymology. 2nd edn. Basingstoke: Macmillan Press and New York: Stockton Press: 1996: 483–501. 4. Godfrey, T., West. S. (eds) Industrial Enzymology. 2nd edn. Basingstoke: Macmillan Press and New York: Stockton Press; 1996. 5. Fullbrook. P.D. Practical limits and prospects (kinetics). In: Godfrey, T., West, S. (eds). Industrial Enzymology. 2nd edn. Basingstoke: Macmillan Press and New York: Stockton Press; 1996: 503–540. 6. Goodenough, P.W. Food enzymes and the new technology. In: Tucker. G.A.. Woods, L.F.J. (eds). Enzymes in Food Processing. 2nd edn. Glasgow: Blackie Academic and Professional: 1995: 41–113. 7. Law, B.A. Manipulation of enzymes for industrial application: Protein and environmental engineering. In: Godfrey, T.. West, S. (eds). Industrial Enzymology. 2nd edn. Basingstoke: Macmillan Press and New York: Stockton Press; 1996: 385-393. 8. Godfrey, T, West. S. Introduction to industrial enzymology. In: Godfrey, T., West, S. (eds). Industrial Enzymology. 2nd edn. Basingstoke: Macmillan Press and New York: Stockton Press: 1996: 1–8. 9. International Dairy Federation. Provisional IDF Standard 157A. 1997. 10. Pandey, A., Benjamin, S., Soccol, C.R., Nigam. P.. Krieger. N., Soccol. V.T. The realm of lipases in biotechnology. Biotechnol. Appl. Biochem. 1999: 29: 119–131. 11. Chen, W.-P. Glucose isomerase. A review. Process Biochem. 1980; June/July: 30-35. 12. Chen, W.-P. Glucose isomerase. A review. Process Biochem. 1980; August/September: 36–41. 13. Quax. W.J., Mrabet, N.T., Luiten, R.G.M., Shwerhuizen, P.W., Stanssens. P.. Lasters. I. Stabilisation of xylose isomerase by lysine residue engineering. Bio/Technology. 1991: 8: 783–742.

Enzymes for bread, pasta and noodle products Joan Qi Si and Cornelia Drost-Lustenberger



Bread, noodles and pasta are among the most basic, common and low-cost foods and their manufacture is often dependent on the traditions of the countries or regions in which they are consumed. However, ancient as bread, noodle and pasta-making are, they are also closely related to biotechnology. This chapter reviews the effects of different types of enzymes and the synergistic effects when they are combined with each other during the bread-making process. It will also give examples of enzyme use in Asian noodles and pasta. 2.2


Consumers have certain quality criteria for bread, including appearance, freshness, taste, flavour, variety, and a consistent quality. It is a great challenge for the baking industry to meet these criteria, for several reasons. Firstly, the main ingredient of the bread—flour—varies due to wheat variety, weather during the growing season, and milling technology. Although millers attempt to blend wheat from different sources to produce flour with a good and consistent baking quality, it often proves difficult to satisfy both high-quality and low-cost standards at the same time. Secondly, because bread preferences differ, the baking industry uses ingredients with different qualities and employs different baking procedures. For instance, English sandwich bread, with its fine crumb structure and very soft texture, is not popular with the French, who want baguettes with crispy crust, large holes, and good crumb chewiness. Thirdly, consumer preferences are shifting towards healthier products. It is sometimes possible to make new bread varieties by simply adjusting the formulation or baking procedure. However, in other cases, bakers may have to develop new techniques. Therefore, both millers and bakers need ingredients or process aids such as chemical oxidants, emulsifiers and enzymes to standardise the quality of the products and diversify the product range. For decades enzymes such as malt and microbial alpha-amylases have been used for bread making. Due to the changes in the baking industry and the demand for more varied and natural products, enzymes have gained more and more importance in bread formulations. Through new and rapid developments in biotechnology, a number of new enzymes have recently been made available to



the baking industry. One example is pure xylanase, with single activity instead of traditional hemicellulase preparations, which improves the dough machinability. A lipase has a gluten strengthening effect that results in more stable dough and improved crumb structure similar to DATEM or SSL/CSL and a maltogenic alpha-amylase that has a unique anti-staling effect. 2.2.7 Fungal alpha-amylases Wheat and thus wheat flour contains endogenous and indigenous enzymes, mainly amylases. However, the level of amylase activity varies from one type of wheat to another. The amount of alpha-amylases in most sound, ungerminated wheat or rye flours is negligible [1]. Therefore, most bread flours must be supplemented with alpha-amylases, added in the form of malt flour or fungal enzymes. Many methods are available for the determination of amylase activities as reviewed by Kruger and Lineback [2]. The baking industry and millers use other methods such as falling number (FN) and Brabender amylograph to determine the amylase content and correlate to bread making quality. Although FN is excellent for measuring the activity of cereal amylases including those in malt flour, it is not suitable for measuring the activity of fungal alpha-amylases. Fungal alpha-amylases are generally less thermostable; they are inactivated at temperatures near 65°C. Therefore, fungal alpha-amylases cannot be detected by the standard FN method, which is conducted at 100°C (AACC method 56-8IB, 1972). Perten and co-workers reported a modified FN method for measuring the fungal alpha-amylases activity in flour [3]. Fungal alpha-amylases act on the damaged starch content, which can vary depending on wheat variety and milling conditions. Generally, flour made from hard wheat contains more damaged starch than the soft wheat. The alphaamylases widely used in the baking industry can hydrolyse amylose and amylopectin to release soluble intermediate-size dextrins of DP2–DP12 [4]. The alpha-amylases provide fermentable sugar, which results in an increased volume, better crust colour, and improved flavour. Due to hydrolysis of the damaged starch, a suitable dosage of alpha-amylases results in a desirable dough softening. However, extensive degradation of the damaged starch due to an overdose of alpha-amylases commonly leads to sticky dough. Figure 2.1 illustrates the effect of a fungal amylase on bread quality in terms of bread volume, crumb structure and dough characteristics. The volume and crumb structure improve with increasing dosage of fungal alpha-amylases. Although a high dosage can provide a larger volume increase, the dough would be too sticky to work with. The optimum dosage is thus defined as the dosage with maximum reachable volume without a sticky dough. For the examples in figure 2.1, the optimum dosage for both flours is around 15 FAU/kg flour (FAU = fungal alpha-amylase units).



Figure 2.1 Dosage response of fungal amylase in different flours. E3 — flour type 1; E3 = crumb structure; C3 = flour type 2. FAU is units of fungal alpha--amylase.

2.2.2 Amylases to extend shelf life Bread staling is responsible for significant financial losses to both consumers and bread producers. Staling corresponds to loss of freshness in terms of flavour, texture, perceived moisture level and other product characteristics. It is estimated that 3-5% of all baked goods produced in the US are discarded due to a loss of freshness, which may exceed 1 billion US$ [5]. Crumb softness and crumb elasticity are important characteristics for the description of crumb freshness perceived by consumers. Softness indicates the force needed to compress the crumb, whereas elasticity indicates the resiliency or the resistance given by the crumb while being pressed. The two texture characteristics may not necessarily correspond to each other: that is, the softest bread may not necessarily have the most elastic crumb texture or vice versa. Bread staling results in reduction of crumb elasticity and increase of crumb firmness. Figure 2.2 depicts how crumb softness and elasticity are determined from the graph of a texture analyser. Factors influencing the crumb softness and elasticity It is important to discuss the differences between the true anti-staling effect (i.e. the effect on the starch retrogradation) and other factors which have an effect

Figure 2.2 Curve of a softness/elasticity measurement using a texture analyser.



on crumb softness without necessarily involving starch retrogradation. A few of the factors influencing the crumb texture are described below. Quality of wheat flour. First of all, the level of indigenous and endogenous amylases will influence the starch retrogradation as well as the yeast action, thereby affecting properties of the final bread quality such as volume. Secondly, the level of damaged starch in the flour has an influence on the action of cereal and fungal alpha-amylase, and therefore on the final quality of the bread. Bread volume. A larger loaf, that is, one with high specific volume, has a softer crumb than a smaller loaf with a low specific volume and dense crumb. Crumb structure. A fine crumb structure with thin cell walls and uniform crumb cells gives a softer crumb than a coarse crumb structure with thick cell walls. Formulation and procedures. Besides flour, most of the ingredients used for bread making have an influence on the crumb texture. For instance, addition of shortening will result in softer crumb because of significantly increased volume and complexes with starch. Any ingredient or procedure that has an influence on loaf volume or crumb structure will influence the crumb texture. Figure 2.3 shows the changes of the crumb softness and elasticity of European sandwich (straight dough) bread and American sponge and dough bread during nine days storage at 24°C. The freshly produced sponge and dough loaves are generally softer and less elastic than the straight dough loaves due to the different procedures and ingredients used. When bread staling occurs during storage, crumb firmness increases and the elasticity decreases regardless of the procedure and ingredients.

Figure 2.3 The crumb softness (a) and elasticity (b) of sponge and dough compared to straight dough procedure.



A process factor or an ingredient can improve the crumb softness (i.e. reduce crumb firmness), but may not have any influence on starch retrogradation. Figures 2.4 and 2.5 show one example of how the process influences crumb softness and elasticity through improvement of crumb structure. Both loaves were baked using identical ingredients and baking procedures except panning. Both were baked at the same time and stored under the same conditions. As a result of a twisting step before panning, the crumb structure produced from the twisted method is much more uniform than the non-twisted. The improved

Figure 2.4 Crumb section of European toast bread from (a) one piece dough method: (b) two piece dough twisted method.

Figure 2.5 The crumb softness (a) and elasticity (b) of European sandwich bread: influence of crumb structure on crumb texture.



crumb structure is the reason for a significantly softer crumb and higher elasticity throughout the whole storage period of nine days as shown by figure 2.5. Storage condition. Storage temperature and package quality have an impact on the crumb texture. It is well known that cold temperatures induce the retrogradation of starch and thereby increase the staling rate. Moisture loss because of to poor packaging results in a faster staling of bread. Starch retrogradation. Bread staling has been investigated for nearly 150 years, but the precise mechanism is still far from being understood, and the debate continues as to the general nature of the processes involved [6]. However, most researchers consider starch retrogradation as the primary cause of crumb staling. Recently, several publications presented new results on their studies on the mode of action of amylases and their role in preventing staling [7–9]. To discuss all the studies that have been conducted is beyond the scope of this chapter. The consensus among them appears to be that changes in starch (especially the amylopectin part) modified by the alpha-amylase play the major role in the anti-staling effect. Although the consumer's perception of crumb freshness may be independent of the cause of a given crumb texture, it is critically important for those involved in product development in the baking industry to understand and differentiate between these factors. When comparing or selecting the optimum ingredient for the desired crumb texture, it is important to control or standardise the above factors when setting up the experimental design. For instance, the volume of the loaf samples should be controlled before measuring softness and elasticity. A longer shelf life means the stored bread has as soft a crumb and as high a resiliency as fresh bread. The optimum anti-staling agent should be the one that can maintain the crumb softness as well as the crurnb elasticity throughout the storage of the bread. Effect of different alpha-amylases on bread staling and bread quality While fungal amylases are effective in partially hydrolysing damaged starch, and are often added to flour as supplements to develop desirable properties such as ovenspring and a brown colour in the crust, they have limited anti-staling effect due to their limited thermostability. They are, for the most part, inactivated prior to the onset of starch gelatinisation during baking when the bulk of the starch is available for modification. The bacterial alpha-amylase from Bacillus subtilis is able to inhibit staling by hydrolysing glycosidic linkages within the amorphous areas of gelatinised starch. However, this thermostable bacterial alpha-amylase can easily be overdosed. Its pure endo-action excessively degrades the starch during baking, causing collapsing of the bread immediately after removal from the oven.



Due to the high degree of thermostability, the enzymes can persist throughout baking and cooling and produce an excessive level of soluble dextrins. As a result the final product is often unacceptable, with gummy crumb texture or even sticky crumb causing problems during slicing and retail storage. Maltogenic alpha-amylase has thermostability between that of fungal alphaamylase and thermostable bacterial alpha-amylase [10]. Therefore, it is able to hydrolyse the glycosidic linkages of the gelatinised starch during the baking process, but it does not excessively degrade the starch because it is inactivated during the later stage of baking [6]. Figure 2.6 depicts the difference in action pattern between the bacterial and maltogenic alpha-amylases. A major advantage with maltogenic alpha-amylase is its tolerance to overdosing during the bread making process in the bakery. Even fungal alphaamylase can cause sticky dough or over-browning of the crust if overdosed. Maltogenic alpha-amylase does not affect dough rheological properties due to its low activity at a temperature under 35°C. It is highly active only at a temperature during starch gelatinisation while it does not excessively degrade the starch, but mainly produces small soluble dextrins. The overdosing risk is. therefore, much lower than with the other two types of amylases. Figure 2.7 shows loaves of bread baked with three different kinds of amylases. Addition of maltogenic alpha-amylase in the sponge and dough bread can prolong shelf life for at least four days longer compared to 0.5% powdered distilled monoglycerides. As seen in figure 2.8, the crumb softness of the loaf with maltogenic alpha-amylase at day 7 was as soft as the loaf with 0.5% distilled monoglycerides at day 3; the elasticity of the loaf with maltogenic alpha-amylase at day 7 is even higher than the loaf with distilled monoglycerides Maltogenic amylase


Amylopectin degradation dominant + small sugars

Classical thermostable amylases

Amylose and • amylopectin I degraded endo-wise *

Reduced recrystallisation of amylopectin (dominates after 24 h)

f Soft, elastic bread crumb

Soft, but gummy and inelastic bread crumb

Figure 2.6 A model suggestion of modified amylopectin by maltogenic and thermostabile bacterial alpha-amylases.



Figure 2.7 Toast bread containing maltogenic alpha-amylase, soy beta-amyiase, bacterial alphaamylase that has been hand squeezed after three days at 24°C. The loaf with the bacterial amylase is unacceptable. Due to the excessive degradation of starch during baking and during storage, the crumb is sticky.

Figure 2.8 Sponge and dough procedure using American flour; (a) crumb softness, (b) crumb elasticity. Volume difference: max. ±3%. DMG = fine powdered distilled monoglycerides; MANU = units of maltogenic alpha-amylase/kg flour; KNU = units of bacterial alpha-amylase/kg flour; BANU = units of soy beta-amylase/kg flour; AFAU = units of acid fungal alpha-amylase/kg flour.

at day 3. Although the bacterial alpha-amylase gave the softest crumb, it was very gummy with an extremely low elasticity value. In one study [4] it was shown that maltogenic alpha-amylase produces mainly DP2 (i.e. maltose). It also produces small fractions of DP 1-DP6 in a starch-water gel that has a similar starch:water ratio as that in normal bread, whereas fungal alpha-amylase releases small amounts of DPI-SP12. Later studies [9] showed that maltogenic alpha-amylase could release linear maltodextrins up to at least DP7 under actual baking conditions, whereas beta-amylase and glucoamylase only form maltose and glucose respectively.



Figure 2.9 Effect of maltogenic alpha-amylase on retarding starch retrogradation measured by differential scanning calorimetry (DSC). The maltogenic alpha-amylase reduces the endothermic area (enthalpy J/g) significantly after storage of 2-9 days.

The dextrins produced by the amylases in the baked bread give different dextrin distributions to those in the control loaf [6], therefore these can undoubtedly be correlated to the changes in the staling rate. These dextrins produced in the baked bread have a different function than that of added maltodextrins. Starch retrogradation can be measured using differential scanning colorimetry (DSC). Figure 2.9 shows DSC measurement of the effect of treating a starch-water gel with maltogenic alpha-amylase compared to treatment with fungal alpha-amylase, pullulanase, distilled monoglycerides and a control. 2.2.3


There are 3–4% (w/w) pentosans in normal wheat flour, partially soluble and partially insoluble. Xylanase or pentosanases, often commonly called hemicellulases, have long been used as dough-conditioning enzymes, especially in European-type bread, because they have demonstrated desirable effects as dough conditioning enzymes. At the optimum dosage they can improve dough machinability, dough stability, oven-spring, larger loaf volume and improved crumb structure [11,12]. Because of the beneficial effects they have on loaf volume and crumb structure, the addition of hemicellulases results in a softer crumb. With the presence of fungal alpha-amylase in the product, this effect on softness is even more pronounced. Through recombinant gene technology, some xylanases made from genetically modified organisms (GMO) are now on the market [13]. The benefit of using a xylanase instead of a traditional pentosanase is that there are far fewer side activities in the xylanase product. Consequently, a lower dosage is



needed to achieve the same effect with less risk of possible interference from side activities. The enzyme quality is also more consistent. Pentosanases and xylanases can be overdosed due to overdegradation of wheat pentosans, thereby destroying the water-binding capability of the wheat pentosans. The result of overdosing is a sticky dough. A suitable dosage of these enzymes results in a desirable softening of dough, thereby improving the machinability. An optimum dosage is therefore defined as the dosage that gives the maximum improvement of the dough and bread properties without causing dough stickiness. The optimum dosage of pentosanases or xylanases varies according to the flour, as illustrated in figure 2.10. The optimum dosage of this particular xylanase for type 1 flour is 120–200 FXU (fungal xylanase units) and for type 2 flour is 80 FXU. The true mechanism of xylanase in bread making has not been clearly elucidated, although a number of different approaches have been examined. The composition of pentosans varies depending on the flour type [141. The interaction between pentosans and gluten plays an important role that has not yet been defined. Most commercially available enzyme preparations used for studies consist of several enzyme activities including amylase, protease, and several

Figure 2.10 Dosage response of xylanase in different flours. Dough stickiness: 4 = normal; 3.5 = acceptable; 3 = sticky; 2.5 = too sticky. %& = flour type 1; d = flour type 2.



hemicellulases. The work of Hamer and co-worker [11,15] indicates that the use of pentosanases increases gluten coagulation in a diluted dough system. Si and Goddik [17] reported that a good baking xylanase increases the gluten strength measured by dynamic rheological methods on a Bohlin rheometer VOR. By measuring the gluten extracted from a dough system, the good baking xylanase increased storage modulus G' and G". At the same time the gluten became more elastic because the phase angle 8 decreased, whereas the two other xylanases, which did not show good baking performance, had no significant effect on gluten strengthening. Figure 2.11 shows the effect of a commercially available baking xylanase on the rheological properties of gluten extracted from a wheat flour dough measured on a Bohlin rheometer VOR [18]. At the dosages that give good baking performance, 50–100 FXU/kg flour, the gluten was strengthened and more elastic. These improved rheological properties explain the positive effect of this xylanase on bread making (i.e. increased oven spring, resulting in larger volume and improved dough stability). At an excessive level of 400 FXU/kg flour, which gave a very sticky dough, G' is the same as for the control and the phase angle shows that the gluten is more viscous. Different xylanase or pentosanase preparations have different effects on arabinoxylans (pentosans) in terms of their scission points and reaction products: therefore, they have different effects on bread making [16]. Although many analytical methods are available for assaying pentosanases or xylanases using a wide range of substrates, there is still no analytical method in which the enzyme units can correlate to the baking performance when comparing different types of xylanases or pentosanases. It has been reported that no correlation to the baking performance was found when different xylanase preparations from different sources were submitted to the same standardised assay using purified substrate

Figure 2.11 The effect of xylanase on the rheological properties of gluten. The diagram on the left shows the storage modulus G' of gluten for different levels of FXU/kg flour. The diagram on the right shows the phase angle S.



and baking tests [19]. One possible explanation is that once the wheat pentosans, both soluble or insoluble, were extracted from the flour, the mechanism of the interactions between wheat pentosans and gluten could no longer be assayed. Xylanase indirectly influences the gluten, as discussed above. A possible mechanism of pentosanases mentioned by Hamer [11] is that the enzyme can offset the negative effects of insoluble pentosans present in the flour, because insoluble pentosans are regarded as having a negative effect on loaf volume and crumb structure. A study conducted by Jacobsen and Si [16] using four different pure xylanases concluded that the best enzyme in terms of baking performance was the xylanase with a certain level of activity towards both soluble and insoluble wheat arabinoxylans (pentosans) in a dough system. The xylanase which had most activity towards the insoluble arabinoxylans gave a dough too sticky to be acceptable. Pentosanases also find application in the production of bread from rye and wheat/rye blends. The baking performance of a rye flour is related to the swelling capacity and solubility of its pentosans and to its starch/pentosan ratio. Appropriate application of pentosanases balances the water absorbtion capacities of the pentosans with the starch. This initially provides better dough extensibility and handling and prevents further separation of crumb from crust during baking. 2.2.4


Lipase has recently been recognised as a strong dough-conditioning enzyme. It shows excellent effects on bread performance. The loaf volumes of various bread types increase significantly and the crumb structure is more silky and uniform with a whiter appearance. As shown in figure 2.12, the lipase can partially or fully replace emulsifiers such as DATEM or SSL/CSL; its overall performance depends on the procedure, formulation and raw material and the presence of other improving ingredients. Both the influence of wheat lipids in bread making and the mode of action of the lipase [32, 33] are not yet fully understood. The hypothesis that monoglycerides are produced in situ cannot explain the effects of the lipase demonstrated above. Monoglycerides are known to have mainly an anti-staling effect; they have little dough conditioning effect compared with lipase. Furthermore, the contents of total lipids in most wheat flours is in the range of 1–1.5%. Regarding the limited hydrolysis degree [20] and limited quantity of triglycerides of saturated fatty acids in a dough system, an insufficient amount of monoglycerides of saturated fatty acids is produced to exhibit the effects described earlier. Besides, the monoglycerides produced by this 1,3-specific lipase would be second-position monoglycerides. It was reported that first and third-position monoglycerides are more able to form complexes with starch, thus having a retarding effect on starch staling [21].



Figure 2.12 A new baking lipase mimics the improving effects of the SSL in white bread (a) or emulsifier blends in multigrain breads (b) to yield loaves with equivalent or even improved volume and crumb structure.

Addition of a fungal lipase to a flour dough does not significantly change the Theological properties of the dough measured by both farinograph and extensograph [18] with optimum water absorption. This is a good characteristic for bread making, because most bakers do not like major changes in the dough system. However, when the rheological property of the gluten treated by the lipase was measured using the dynamic rheological method, it was found that the reason for the good dough conditioning effect of this lipase is the increase of gluten strength, as shown in figure 2.13. The gluten taken from lipase-treated wheat flour dough is significantly stronger, with an increased G'. and more



Figure 2.13 The effect of lipase on the Theological properties of gluten. The diagram on the left shows G', the storage modules of gluten. The diagram on the right shows the phase angle &. LU is units of lipase/kg flow.

elasticity, shown by a lower 8 than the control. Excess lipase results in too strong a gluten complex with a very high G', which gives a dough that is too stiff and a smaller volume increase, as mentioned earlier. The gluten treated with lipase has a high G' and increased relaxation time, indicating an increase of cross-links in the gluten networks measured by the dynamic stress relaxation method [19]. The nature of these extra cross-links has yet to be elucidated. It was assumed that glycolipids form a linkage between gliadin and glutenin through hydrogen bonds and hydrophobic interactions [22,23]. Work at the University of Lund indicated that the lipase increased the thermostability of the reversed hexagonal phase of the liquid-crystalline phase during heating up to 100°C [24]. This observation is suggested as a possible mechanism for lipase in bread making [25]. Because Upases are gaining more and more attention in the baking industry, studies in the near future should give us a better understanding of the mode of action of lipase for bread making. 2.2.5 Oxidases Oxidants, such as ascorbic acid, bromate and ADA, are widely used for bread making and have been thoroughly studied. However, the true mechanism of the oxidants in bread making has not been established, although a number of hypotheses have been offered. It is generally known that bromate is a slowacting oxidant that becomes active at high temperatures. In relation to baking, it has the maximum effect in the later stages of proving and in the early stages of baking, whereas ascorbic acid and other oxidants are fast-acting oxidants, having the maximum effect during mixing and proving.



Increasing demands by consumers for more natural products with fewer chemicals, and especially concerns about the possible risks of bromate in food, have created the need for bromate replacements. Therefore, oxidases are gaining increasing attention in the baking industry. Glucose oxidase for bread making has been known since 1957 [26]. Although lipoxygenase, lysyl oxidase, sulfhydryl oxidase [27], peroxidase [28,29], laccase [30] and transglutaminase have been reported to have good oxidising effects, there is little known about oxidases for bread making. Glucose oxidase has good oxidising effects that result in a stronger dough. It can be used to replace oxidants such as bromate and ascorbic acid in some baking formulations and procedures. In other formulations it is an excellent dough strengthener along with ascorbic acid. Examples of applications of glucose oxidase combined with other enzymes for bread making are given in the next section. 2.2.6

Synergistic effects of enzymes Enzymes for dough conditioning Using enzyme combinations for baking bread is not new. It is well known that combining a hemicellulase or xylanase with fungal alpha-amylase has a synergistic effect. As shown in figure 2.14 a high dosage of a pure xylanase may give some volume increase, but the dough with this dosage of xylanase would be too sticky to be handled in practice. When the xylanase is combined with

Figure 2.14 Synergistic effect of amylase and xylanase. ^ = volume index; CD — crumb structure.



even a very small amount of fungal alpha-amylase, a lower dosage of xylanase with the alpha-amylase provides a larger volume increase and better overall score without the problem of dough stickiness. Possible new combinations with improved functionality are continuously arising from new enzymes through product development in the enzyme industry [31]. For instance, as lipase does not make the dough sticky and significantly improves dough stability and crumb structure, synergistic effects between xylanase, amylase and lipase could improve bread quality. Due to its effect on gluten strengthening, lipase improves dough stability against over-fermentation. Figure 2.15 shows the combination of the enzymes for a French baguette (trials were conducted at the ENSMIC Baking Laboratory, Paris). Without any enzyme, the baguette had poor stability against over-fermentation. With the addition of alpha-amylase alone or in combination with xylanase, the volume and overall scores of the bread improved. When alpha-amylase, xylanase, and lipase were used together, the overall scores were further improved. The dough exhibited notably good stability against over-fermentation, resulting in significantly better baguettes. Figure 2.16 shows that on addition of xylanase, loaf volume is slightly improved. Using a xylanase in combination with fungal alpha-amylase, the volume is further increased; it also improves the crumb structure, so the cell walls are thinner and the crumb is silkier. When combining lipase with the other enzymes, not only is the loaf volume further increased, but also the crurnb

Figure 2.15 The synergistic effect of enzymes for the French baguette. E2i = volume; CD = volume over proved; ffl = total scores; ESI = total score, over proved.



Figure 2.16 Improvement of loaf volume on addition of xylanase.

structure is significantly improved with more uniform crumb cells. Consequently, this loaf would have the softest crumb among these samples. This shows that the combination of lipase with alpha-amylase or xylanase can provide a fine, silky and uniform crumb structure to loaves made with a straight dough process. Combining enzymes to maximise shelf life As mentioned before, maltogenic alpha-amylase is a true anti-staling enzyme that affects neither bread volume nor crumb structure. Therefore, it is quite feasible to use this enzyme in combination with enzymes such as fungal alphaamylase, xylanase and lipase to ensure that other bread quality parameters such as volume, dough stability, and crumb structure are improved. As shown in figure 2.17, a combination of the four enzymes gave the softest crumb throughout the entire storage period of 9 days. The softness of the bread with these four enzymes at day 9 was the same as that of the loaf with 0.5% of distilled monoglycerides at day 3. It is, however, important to note that these enzymes, except the maltogenic alpha-amylase, have no effect on the crumb elasticity. The crumb elasticity, which indicates the resilience of the crumb upon storage, is only affected by the increasing dosage of the maltogenic alpha-amylase. Enzymes for dough strengthening Glucose oxidase has good oxidising effects that result in stronger dough. In combination with other enzymes such as xylanase and alpha-amylase, it can be used to replace oxidants such as bromate and ADA in some baking formulations and procedures. In other formulations when it is added with ascorbic acid, it is an excellent dough strengthener.



Figure 2.17 The synergistic effect of maltogenic alpha-amylase in combination with fungal alphaamylase, xylanase and lipase compared to distilled monoglycerides in American type sponge and dough bread; (a) crumb softness, (b) crumb elasticity. DMU = fine powder distilled monoglycerides. 50 pprn FSMA = 12.5 FAU units of fungal alpha-amylase and 100 FXU units of xylanase per kg flour. LU = units of iipase/kg flour, MANU = units of maltogenic alpha-amylase/kg flour, DMG = fine powder distilled monoglycerides.

There are benefits in adding a combination of glucose oxidase, xylanase and fungal amylase to ascorbic acid when baking French batards. Adding the enzymes improves the stability of the dough during processing which results in batards with greater volume. The enzyme combination also improves the bloom, yielding a more desirable crispy crust. Figure 2.18 shows a similar benefit obtained by adding a combination of glucose oxidase, xylanase and fungal amylase to ascorbic acid when baking Kaiser rolls. Addition of the enzymes results in a markedly improved volume and a more defined cut pattern.

Figure 2.18 The roll on the right has had a combination of enzymes added to ascorbic acid, while that on the left has untreated ascorbic acid.



Figure 2.19 shows that adding a combination of glucose oxidase and fungal amylase to ascorbic acid makes a bagel with significantly improved volume. Glucose oxidase combined with fungal alpha-amylase can replace the bromate in some bread formulations. Figure 2.20 shows a type of South American

Figure 2.19 The bagels on the right have had a combination of enzymes added to ascorbic acid: those on the left have untreated ascorbic acid.

Figure 2.20 The effect of adding enzymes to Marraquetta.



bread, Marraquetta. This procedure requires dough with high stability because after two 50 min proving sessions, the dough is turned around (subjected to mechanical stress) before baking. Dough without strong dough stability will collapse when turned. The basic formulation contains both ascorbic acid and potassium bromate. By adding glucose oxidase and fungal alpha-amylase instead of bromate, the final bread has a much improved appearance and a volume increase of approximately 40%. 2.2.7 Enzymes for frozen dough and part-baked bread Frozen dough has gained more and more popularity within the baking industry because it creates the opportunity to save on labour and equipment while providing freshly baked goods for the consumer at in-store bakeries, food services and in restaurants. The major problem with production of frozen dough is deterioration in volume and overall quality of the products. Many studies have shown that frozen dough stability is related to factors such as flour quality, ingredients, formulation, process, freezing and thawing conditions [34, 35]. The growth of ice crystals during freezing, freeze-thaw-cycles or frozen storage may cause physical disruption of the membrane of yeast cells. The loss of cytoplasm causes the yeast cells to die and production of carbon dioxide is no longer ensured. Reduced volume or prolonged proving time and undesirable appearance of the thawed and baked bread is the result. The autolysis of yeast cells, caused by concentration of organic metabolism products during freezing out the water phase, has been reported [34]. Furthermore, ice recrystallisation contributes towards mechanical disruption and weakening of the threedimensional protein network which is responsible for gas retention. Weakening of the gluten structure and of the dough leads to less retention of gas, and lower volumes [36, 37]. The effects of different ingredients or chemical improving agents on the quality of bread made from frozen dough have been extensively reported [34, 38, 39]. This section describes the use of some enzymes and enzyme combinations to reduce quality deterioration in frozen systems. It focuses on unproved frozen dough, partially proved frozen dough and part-baked frozen baguettes and buns, Unproved frozen dough Xylanase and amylase. The functions of xylanases and fungal amylases have been previously discussed in this chapter. The indirect effect of xylanase on the strengthening of gluten in fresh dough also applies to frozen dough. Improvements in dough stability, volume and crumb structure are achieved during long frozen storage. Figure 2.21 shows the volume improvement when a combination of xylanase and fungal alpha-amylase is added to the formula. The crumb structure is also



Figure 2.21 Effect of xylanase and fungal alpha-amylase in bread baked from unproved frozen dough. In the bread on the right containing 50 ppm of a product containing xylanase and fungal alpha-amylase. volume increase and improved crumb structure in terms of less density, elongated cells and thinner cell walls are clearly visible. The dough was stored for 14 weeks at – 18 C. Both breads contain ascorbicacid. DATEM and vegetable shortening in the basic recipe.

improved. After several weeks of frozen storage, the control bread has a rather dense crumb with small round cells and thick cell walls. The addition of xylanase and fungal alpha-amylase reduces the density of the crumb and results in more elongated cells and thinner cell walls. Because of the larger specific volume and the improvement of crumb structure, softness and elasticity of the crumb are also improved. In figure 2.22, and in most of the following figures, the volumes of the control or reference during frozen storage were taken to be 100%, in order to eliminate day-to-day variations in the results. That means that the figure shows the relative improvement of bread containing xylanase and fungal alpha-amylase, compared to the control. The increasing slopes of the graphs thereby do not necessarily mean that the volume increased as result of storage, but rather that it decreased at a lower rate, compared with the control. Figure 2.22 shows a dosage response of xylanase and fungal alpha-amylase in terms of volume. The improvement in volume may be explained by the improved extensibility and less bulky dough structure. A more extensible dough probably moves more easily against growing ice crystals. The destruction of the gluten network by growth and sharpness of ice crystals is reduced and more of the gluten stays intact.


Figure 2.22 Xylanase and fungal amylase.

Glucose oxidase. As described earlier in this chapter, glucose oxidase is an effective gluten-strengthening enzyme, resulting in loaves with increased volume and a better appearance. It is somewhat surprising that in some cases, as illustrated in figure 2.23, the addition of glucose oxidase, even low levels, can have a detrimental effect on the quality of baked goods made from unproved frozen dough. Of course actual results depend on other ingredients in the formula, but in this case, the gluten (not being fully developed at the time of freezing) becomes

Figure 2.23 Effect of glucose oxidase on bread made from frozen dough.



too rigid with the reaction of glucose oxidase. It becomes brittle and even more susceptible to ice crystal damage during frozen storage or freeze-thaw cycles. Pre-proved frozen dough Frozen pre-proved dough presents a particular challenge because when the dough is frozen, the dough is at its weakest point. However, even in this case, enzymes can play an important role to ensure a good quality product. Xylanase and amylase. Figure 2.24 clearly shows that in pre-proved frozen dough significant improvement in volume was achieved by the addition of xylanase and fungal alpha-amylase, or fungal alpha-amylase alone. For this application, dough pieces were made up to small baguettes and rolls and were proved for half the time of optimal proving before they were shock frozen. Glucose oxidase. Glucose oxidase improves the quality of pre-proved or partially proved frozen dough, unlike its effect on unproved frozen dough. The gluten network in a pre-proved dough is developed. Through its oxidising effect, glucose oxidase makes this network stronger and less susceptible to damage by growing ice crystals. Figure 2.25 depicts the volume of rolls produced from preproved frozen dough with different glucose oxidase levels in combination with

Figure 2.24 The volume of baked baguette from pre-proved frozen dough during frozen storage at — 18;C. The graph shows increased volume of baguettes containing fungal alpha-amylase or the combination of fungal alpha-amylase with xylanase.



Figure 2.25 Volume of rolls baked from pre-proved frozen dough. Rolls containing glucose oxidase show significantly increased volumes during frozen dough storage and lower rate of deterioration. 30 ppm of a combination of xylanase and fungal alpha-amylase is added to the basic recipe. GODU — units of glucose oxidase/kg flour.

xylanase and fungal alpha-amylase. Glucose oxidase strengthens the gluten and stabilises the gluten network without causing the rigidity seen in unproved frozen dough. Addition of glucose oxidase resulted in an improved volume and reduced rate of deterioration during frozen storage. Part-baked, frozen bread Baguettes. In part-baked baguettes, effects of enzymes are similar to their effects in freshly baked baguettes. Volume and bloom are significantly improved by using a combination of xylanase and fungal alpha-amylasz. The quality of the part-baked baguettes is further improved using the combination of xylanase and fungal alpha-amylase and glucose oxidase, as shown in figure 2.26. Buns. Several enzymes and their combinations were also tested in part-baked Hamburger buns using a straight dough procedure, European flour and a formula with limited chemical additives and low water absorption. As shown in figure 2.27, 120 ppm of a combination of hemicellulase and fungal alphaamylase gives a significant improvement in the volume and symmetry of the buns. Using a combination of xylanase and fungal alpha-amylase instead of hemicellulase and fungal alpha-amylase resulted in exactly the same effect (data not shown here). Combining glucose oxidase at a dosage of 200 GODU/kg flour with 120 ppm of a combination of hemicellulase and fungal alpha-amylase



Figure 2.26 Effect of 30 ppm of a combination of xylanase and fungal alpha-amylase and 150 GODU in partially baked, frozen baguettes. Frozen storage conditions were – 18 C C for 3 months.

Figure 2.27 Part-baked straight dough Hamburger buns; (a) relative volume, (b) symmetry of bun. Dosage: 120 ppm of a combination of hemicellulase and fungal alpha-amylase, 200 GODU. 450 MANU. • = reference; C3 = hemicellulase; CH = hemicellulase + glucose oxidase; • = hemicellulase + maltogenic alpha-amylase + glucose oxidase.

further increased volume and especially improved the symmetry and overall appearance of the buns. One important parameter, particularly for hot dog or sandwich buns, is the hinge strength. This term describes the 'holding together' of two halves of a bun when nearly cut apart. The two halves should hold together under mechanical



Figure 2.28 Hinge strength of buns with (a) and without (b) enzyme.

strain. Using an enzyme combination of amylases, hemicellulase and glucose oxidase can significantly improve this hinge strength. Figure 2.28 shows that the reference bun without enzymes broke into two after having been bent back and forth a few times. The bun with the described enzyme mix shows a strong 'holding effect' between the two halves. This effect is mainly pronounced in formulae with relatively low water absorption. Shelf life extension of bread made from frozen dough Bread baked from frozen dough is reported to be even more susceptible to firming than bread baked from freshly made dough [41–43]. Bread baked from unproved frozen dough that has been frozen for 7 weeks is firmer than bread made from dough frozen for 5 days. As in bread made from fresh dough using amylases, in particular maltogenic alpha-arnylase, the staling rate can be reduced significantly. Bread baked from frozen dough containing maltogenic alpha-amylase or a combination of maltogenic alpha-amylase and xylanase and fungal alpha-amylase is significantly softer after baking than the reference containing 0.5% distilled monoglycerides. Again, as in bread made from fresh dough, maltogenic alpha-amylase provides much more crumb elasticity after baking compared to bread containing monoglycerides. These results show that maltogenicalpha-amylase prolongs the shelf life of bread not only during storage of the baked bread, but that it is also effective after a long freezing process and provides better quality with a softer and more elastic crumb texture. Figure 2.29 again shows the effect of maltogenic alpha-amylase and its combination with fungal alpha-amylasz and xylanase compared to that of distilled monoglycerides in bread baked from dough that was stored for 7 weeks at – 18°C. The results show that the effect of enzymes on crumb texture is not only significantly better than that of distilled monoglycerides during bread storage, but also for fresh bread.



Figure 2.29 Softness (a) and elasticity (b) of bread baked from frozen dough after 7 weeks of frozen storage at — 18°C. After baking the bread was stored at 24°C and measured after 1,3 and 6 days. Volume was controlled. DMG = fine powdered distilled monoglycerides; 900 MANU = units of the maltogenic alpha-amylase per kg flour; 30ppm FSMA = 7.5 FAU units of fungal alpha-amylase and 67.5 FXU units of xylanase.


Enzymes for Asian noodles and non-durum pasta [44]

The application of a fungal lipase in pasta or noodle production could improve product quality. This section reviews some of the positive effects of lipase on the quality characteristics of pasta or noodles, such as colour, colour stability, biting quality, stickiness and cooking tolerance. Results from DSC and light microscopy have confirmed increased formation of amylose-lipid complexes as a result of the lipase treatment. These complexes inhibit the swelling of the starch granules, especially in the outer layer of the noodle or spaghetti strand, resulting in a firmer texture and a smooth surface. 2.3.1 Reducing speckiness A common problem in noodles and pasta is speckiness (i.e. small dark spots) the quantity of which is mainly dependent on the level of flour purification (extraction) or ash content. An addition of the fungal lipase reduces noodle speckiness. The lipase addition also reduces the increase in speckiness over time (figure 2.30). 2.3.2

Increasing brightness and colour stability

Darkening of raw noodles or noodle dough sheets during production or shelf life can be a serious problem. Figure 2.31 shows colour measurements of raw, white, salted noodle dough sheets. Treatment with lipase increased the brightness of noodles produced from two different flours made with slightly



Figure 2.30 Effect of lipase on reducing speckiness in white salted noodles (dough sheets), Australian Eradu wheat, measured by Branscan. Dosage: kLU/kg flour. LU = lipase units.

Figure 2.31 Brightness of white salted noodles (raw dough sheets), Australia Eradu wheat, measured by Minolta CR310. Dosage: kLU/kg flour. LU = lipase units.

different production procedures and different colour measuring equipments. Lipase addition also reduced the darkening rate during storage of raw noodles. During production of instant noodles, the colour of the noodle sheet can change within the time frame of production before the noodles are steamed. Addition of lipase gave substantially higher L* values than the control and also reduced the rate of darkening in the first 30min (figure 2.32). Brightness is also a very important parameter for cooked noodles. Noodles with smooth surface characteristics are brighter than noodles that have a mushy and uneven surface. Cooked white salted noodles (figure 2.33) showed increased in brightness when the dough was treated with lipase.



Figure 2.32 Darkening of instant noodle dough within 30 min. Flour: Australian Prime Hard, colour measured by Minolta CR310.

Figure 2.33 Effect of Hpase on colour of cooked white salted noodles, shown 2h after cooking (a), (b) L* of cooked noodle dough sheets. Cooking time: 3 min: flour: Meneba type 550. L* measured by LabScan XE.

2.3.3 Improving texture Firmness, or biting quality, of cooked pasta and noodles is another important characteristic. Firmness can be measured instrumentally either by determining the cutting force of a single noodle strand or by measuring the relative depth of penetration at a specified cutting force (0.1 Newton). The relative depth of penetration at 0.1 N is a better indication of the firmness of the outer layer of a noodle or pasta strand than cutting force. As noodles become firmer, cutting force increases and the relative depth of penetration at a specified cutting force decreases.



Firmness of cooked white salted noodles increased after treatment of the dough with increasing dosage of lipase (figure 2.34). Increasing lipase dosage also improved the over-cooking tolerance of noodles (figure 2.35). The degree of softening over-cooked control noodles was more than 25% compared to around 15% for cooked noodles treated with lipase. Stickiness of cooked white salted noodles was assessed using sensory evaluations. Triangle tests were used to compare control noodles to noodles treated with lipase at 40 kLU/kg of flour. The sensory panel was able to detect a significant

Figure 2.34 Firmness of cooked white salted noodles (European flour) measured by texture analyser. Cutting force increases with firmness; % depth of penetration at 0.1 N decreases as firmness of the outer layer increases. LU = lipase unit. Dosage: kLU/kg flour.

Figure 2.35 Comparison of firmness of normally cooked and over-cooked white salted noodles (European flour) measured by texture analyser. Cutting force increases with firmness; % depth of penetration at 0.1 N decreases asfirmnessof the outer layer increases. Dosage: kLU/kg flour. • = cooked for 5.5 inin; D — cooked for 11 min.



difference (p < 0.001) in stickiness between the control and the noodles treated with lipase. All those who could detect a difference between the samples were able to indicate that the control noodles were stickier than the lipase treated noodles. When pasta is produced from bread-wheat flour, the quality in terms of texture, colour and cooking behaviour differs substantially from the pasta made from durum semolina. Figure 2.36, for example, shows the stickiness of pasta produced from bread-wheat flour. When a spaghetti sample was cooked 1 min longer than the 'al dente' point and the stickiness was measured by texture analyser using the integrated adhesive force on the sample towards a withdrawing probe, lipase addition reduced the stickiness of pasta. Furthermore, the lipase also increased the surface firmness of pasta. The pasta sample treated with lipase at 60 kLU per kg flour had a surface firmness level close to that of pasta made from durum semolina. The lipase can improve the physical appearance of the dried pasta products, especially if the raw material had poor gluten quantity and quality, for example, a wet gluten quantity of less than 23-24%. Figures 2.37 and 2.38 show an example

Figure 2.36 Stickiness and firmness of spaghetti produced from European wheat flour (type 550), measured by Zwick. Dosage kLU/kg.

Figure 237 Dry macaroni produced with soft wheat flour. Lipase can reduce cracks caused by low gluten quantity and quality of the flour.



Figure 2.38 Cooked macaroni produced with soft wheat flour. Due to the reduction of cracks by adding lipase, the physical appearance can be improved.

of how the lipase eliminates the cracking problem of macaroni in both dried and cooked product. The cracks occurred when poor quality flour was used. With addition of the lipase at a dosage of 12 kLU/kg flour, and using exactly the same process, the cracks had disappeared. 2.3.4 Mechanisms for the effect of lipase The mechanism of the beneficial effect of lipase in pasta or noodles is not yet fully elucidated and may be due to modification of both the protein and the starch fractions of the flour. Results from differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) measurements of uncooked and cooked pasta produced from common wheat flour indicated that complexes of hydrolysis products of lipase with starch may take place. The formation of amylose—lipid complexes changes the starch fraction of pasta or noodles because the complexes inhibit the swelling of starch granules during cooking. The results from DSC (table 2.1) show that the melting enthalpy of the amylose—lipid complexes in uncooked pasta increased Table 2.1 Amylose—lipid melting enthalpy of uncooked and cooked pasta produced from bread wheat flour Pasta

Amylose—liquid enthalpy (J/g db)

Uncooked Control Lipase

1.37(96.7°C) 2.29 (95.4°C)

Cooked Control Lipase

0.68 (101.3°C) 1.41 (100.8°C)

Dosage: 60 kLU/kg flour.



by approximately 62% when lipase was added to the dough. The cooked pasta treated with lipase showed an increase of around 75% in its melting enthalpy compared to the control. Increased formation of amylose—lipid complexes may reduce the leaching of amylose during cooking, resulting in a firmer texture and a less sticky and smoother surface. Figures 2.39a and 2.40a show light micrographs of cross-sections of the outer layer of white salted noodles produced without lipase at magnifications of 50 x and 200x, respectively; the light micrographs of figures 2.39b and 2.40b show the cross-sections of the outer layer of the noodles treated with lipase at similar magnifications. The noodles were cooked to optimum (3 min) prior to cutting the cross-sections. The light flecks mark the protein fraction. Starch appears dark grey (amylose) or lighter grey (amylopectin and complexed amylose) due to iodine staining. The lack of colouring in the outer layer of the reference noodles indicates that more amylose has leached from the reference sample into the

Figure 2.39 (a) Light micrograph of the outer layer and surface of reference noodles. Magnification: 50x.

Figure 2.39 (b) Light micrograph of the outer layer and surface of noodles treated with 60 kLU lipase/kg flour. Magnification: 50x.



'igure 2.40 (a) Light micrograph of the outer layer and surface of reference noodles. laenification: 200x.

igure 2.40 (b)Light micrograph of the outer layer and surface of noodles treated with 60 kLU lipase/kg our. Magnification: 200x.

ooking water than from the sample treated with lipase, where amylose is both rapped into the structure or bound in the form of amylose—lipid complexes, 'his observation confirms the results found by DSC and also gives a direct ndication that amylose leaching is reduced as a result of enhanced amylose— ipid complexing. Comparing the surface characteristics of noodles with and without lipase (see arrows) shows, that the surface of the lipase-treated noodles 5 much smoother compared to the surface of the control noodles. In the noodles treated with lipase, the starch granules appear less swollen nd the thickness of the outer layer is reduced compared to the reference. This 5 especially shown very clearly in the micrographs with the large magnification >f 200 x. Light microscopy of cross-sections from the centre of the noodles (not hown here) also showed less swelling of starch granules in the centre of noodles vhen treated with lipase compared to the reference sample without lipase.



This effect may explain the firming effect of lipase found in texture measurements of the noodles and pasta. Another potential mode of action of the lipase is its strengthening effect on gluten. This was illustrated for bread earlier in the chapter. This property may also account for part of the increased firmness and cooking tolerance of pasta and noodles after lipase addition. The combined effect on both gluten strengthening and increased amounts of lipid-complexed amylose make lipase a very good aid in improving the quality of noodles and pasta. Acknowledgement This work contains contributions from the following persons: Dr. B. Conde and Dr. Ch. Zweifel from ETH, Zurich, and Todd Forman, Jack B. Nielsen, Andy Christen, Fritz Glansmann, Niclaus Neyelin and Silvia Strachan at Novozymes. Special thanks are given to Todd Forman and Antonia Huber, for their tireless efforts in editing this chapter.

References 1. van Dam, H.W., Hille, J.D.R. Yeast and enzymes in bread making. Cereal Foods World. 1992: 37: 245. 2. Kruger, J.E., Lineback, D., Stauffer, C.E. (eds). Enzymes and their Role in Cereal Technology. St. Paul, MN: American Association of Cereal Chemistry; 1987: 117–130. 3. Perten, H. A modified falling-number method suitable for measuring both cereal and fungal alphaamylase activity. Cereal Chem. 1984: 61: No.2. 4. Si, J.Q., Simonsen, R. Nov. 16–19, Functional mechanism of some microbial amylases anti-staling effect. Proc. Int. Symp. on New Approaches in the Production of Food Stuffs and Intermediate Products from Cereal Grains and Oils Seeds. Beijing. China: 1994. 5. Hebeda, R. et al. Developments in enzymes for retarding staling of baked goods. Cereal Foods World. 1990; 35: No. 5. 6. Gerrard, J. A. et al. The role of maltodextrins in the staling of bread. J. Cereal Sci. 1997:26: 201–209. 7. Morgan, K.R. et al. Staling in starch breads: The effect of antistaling alpha-amylase. Starch/Starke. 1997; 49: 54-59. 8. Martinez-Anaya, M., JimEnez, T. Functionality of enzymes that hydrolyse starch and non-starch polysaccahrides in breadmaking. Z. Lebensm. Unters Forsch. A. 1997; 209–214. 9. Christophersen, C. et al. Enzymatic characterization of maltogenic alpha-amylase. a thermostable alpha-amylase. Starch/Starke. 1998; 50: 39-45. 10. Novamyl = Maltogenic alpha-amylase. Novozymes Product Sheet. (B 547). Available from Novozymes. 11. Hamer, R.J. In: Tucker, G., Woods, L.F. J. (eds) Enzymes in Food Processing. 2nd edn. Glasgow: Blackie Academic & Professional: 1995. 12. Hebeda, R.E. et al. Developments in enzymes or retarding staling of baked goods. Cereal Foods World. 1990; 35(5): 453. 13. Si, J.Q. New developments of enzymes for the baking industry. Proc. VI Meeting on Industrial Applications of Enzymes. Barcelona, November 29-30; 1995.



14. Cleemput, G., Roels, S.P., Van Oort, M., Grobet, P.J., Delcour J.A. Heterogeneity in the structure of water-soluble arabinoxylans in European wheat flours of variable bread making quality. Cereal Chem. 1993; 70(3):324. Hamer, R.J., Weegels, P.L., Marseille, J.P., Kelfkens, M. In: Pomeranz, Y. (ed.). Wheat is Unique. St. Paul, MN: American Association of Cereal Chemistry; 1989: 467. Si, J.Q. A true anti-staling enzyme, distinguish between softness and anti-staling effect. No. 11 Oral presentation at AACC Annual meeting, San Diego. Novozymes article 1997; A–6565. Si, J.Q., Goddik, I.K., Kofod, L. Effect of microbial xylanases on water insoluble wheat pentosans and in correlation with their baking effect. Oral presentation at AACC Annual meeting, Miami. Novozymes 1993; article A–6315. 18. Si, J.Q. Different Rheological methods to elucidate the mechanism of enzymes and their correlation to the performance of bread making. Oral presentation no. 43 at the AACC Annual meeting, Baltimore; September 1996. 19. Jakobsen, T.S., Si, J.Q. The effects of xylanases in baking and characterization of their modes of action. Proc. Congress of Wheat Structure Biochem. and Functions. Reading. UK Novozymes article 1995, A-6393. 20. Si, J.Q., Hansen, T.T. Effect of lipase on bread making in correlation with their effects on dough rheology and wheat lipids. Proc. Int. Symp on New Approaches in the Production of Food Stuffs and Intermediate Products from Cereal Grains and Oil Seeds. Beijing, China; 1994. 21. Krog, N. Interactions of surface-active lipids with water, protein and starch components in food systems. Paper given at the AOCS short courses, Hawaii; 1986. 22. Hoseney, R.C. et al. Functional and biochemical properties of wheat flour components, VI. Gliadinlipid-glutein interaction in wheat gluten. Cereal Chem. 1970; 47:135. 23. Buchuk, W., Bekes, F, McMaster, G.J., Zawistowska, U. Carbohydrate and lipid complexes with gliadin and glutein. In: Graveland, A., Moonen, J.H. (eds). Gluten Protein. Proc. 2nd Int. Workshop on Gluten Protein, Wagenigen. Zeist, the Netherlands: TNO Nutrition and Food Research Institute; 1984: 101. 24. Borne, J. The influence of lipase on lipid phase behaviour and Theological properties of wheat flour dough. Master of Sci. thesis. Lund University, Sweden 1996. 25. Dybdal, L., Si, J.Q., Borne, J., Eliasson, A. Lipases in baking: new approaches to a mechanistic understanding. Proc. 1st European Symp. on Enzymes in Grain Processing. Noordwijkerhout, Holland, 1996. Zeist, the Netherlands: TNO Nutrition and Food Research Institute; 1997. 26. Luther, H.G. US Patent 2,783,150; 1957. 27. Matheis, G., Whitaker, J.R. A review: enzymatic cross-linking of proteins applicable to foods. J. Food Biochem. 1987; 11:309. 28. Maar, J., Martinus, R. European Patent application, 90200668.3 29. Si, J.Q. Use of peroxidase in baking, Patent application, WO 94/28729; 1994. 30. Si, J.Q. Use of laccase in baking, Patent application, WO 94/28728; 1994. 31. Si, J.Q. New enzymes for the baking industry. Food Tech Europe. 1996; 3: 60-64. 32. Bekes, F. et al. Lipid mediated aggregates in flour and in gluten. J. Cereal Sci. 1992; 16: 129. 33. Weegels, P.L., Hamer, R.J. Improving the bread making quality of gluten. Cereal Food World. 1992; 37:379. 34. Stauffer, C.E. Frozen dough production. In: Kamel, B.S., Stauffer, C.E. (eds). Advances in Baking Technology. London: Blackie Academic and Professional; 1993. 35. Abd El-Hady, E. et al. Mikrostruktur von gefrosteten Brotteigen. Getreide Mehl und Brot. 1995: 49: 40–46. 36. Wolt, M.J., D'Appolonia, B.L. Factors involved in the stability of frozen dough. I. The influence of yeast reducing compounds on frozen-dough stability. Cereal Chem. 1984; 61: 209-212. 37. Varriano-Marston, E., Hsu, K.H., Mhadi, J. Rheological and structural changes in frozen dough. Baker's Dig. 1980; 54: 32–34, 41.



38. Rasanen, J., Harkonen, H., Autio, K. Freeze-thaw stability of prefermented frozen lean wheat doughs: effect of flour quality and fermentation time. Cereal Chem. 1995; 72: 637-642. 39. Wang, Z.J., Ponte, J.G. Jr. Improving frozen dough qualities with the addition of vital wheat gluten. Cereal Foods World. 1994; 39: 500-503. 40. Wolt, M.J., D'Appolonia, B.L. Factors involved in the stability of frozen dough. II. The effects of yeast type, flour type, and dough additives on frozen-dough stability. Cereal Chem. 1984; 61: 213-221. 41. Si, J.Q. Synergistic effect of enzymes for breadbaking. Based on oral presentation at AACC annual meeting, 1996 in Baltimore. Novozymes article. 1997; A–06513a. 42. Berglund, P.T., Shelton, D.R. Effect of frozen storage duration on firming properties of breads baked from frozen doughs. Cereal Foods World. 1993: 38: 89-93. 43. Lustenberger, C., Si, J.Q. Enzyme for frozen dough. AACC oral presentation. 1999. (Copy can be requested from Novoymes.) 44. Lustenberger, C., Si, J. Q. Proc. Grain and Bread Conference in Gold Coast Australia. This section is also partially based on the oral presentation at AACC Annual Meeting October 1999. Seattle and on an oral presentation at 2nd European Symposium on Enzymes in Grain Processing, ESEGP-2. December 1999. Helsinki. 2000. (Copy can be requested from Novozymes.)

Enzymes in brewing Diederik J.M. Schmedding and Mari J.M.C. van Gestel



This chapter describes the use of enzymes in the brewing process. It will provide a basis for understanding which enzyme activities in a commercial enzyme preparation are acting on specific components of the raw materials. It will not show typical enzymes and the dose rates used, and so the practical matter of the cost-benefit relationship will not be covered, as this depends heavily on the conditions in the specific brewery, on the quality of its raw materials, and on the cost of the enzyme. Enzymes from the raw materials used in brewing play an extremely important role in the process, as will be shown in this chapter, but due to natural variations, these enzyme levels can vary significantly in the raw materials. Therefore exogenous (i.e. added) enzymes allow more tolerance in the quality of the raw materials and the conditions of the brewing process.

3.1.1 History of brewing The brewing of 'beer' is an activity that goes back to about 5000 BC in the area of the Middle East (Nile, Tigris Euphrates). The 'beer' being made then probably bore little resemblance to the beer that we consume nowadays. The process was probably not developed initially to make 'beer', but arose rather from the preparation of other grain-based foods, where the stored (mashed and malted) grain was 'infected' with microorganisms, such as yeast, which generate ethanol (alcohol) under anaerobic conditions. These early 'beers' must have been very nutritional and porridge-like, and the 'spirit' in these foods must have stimulated early humans to optimise on the production of this indulgent foodstuff. Development took place in the Middle East, and also in other regions, with the basic idea of fermenting grain. Brewing technology today still makes use of the various types of starch sources, such as maize (from the Incas), sorghum (Africa) and rice (from China). There was no understanding of the processes taking place, but it must have been quite clearly understood that generating acidity through lactic acid bacteria fermentation, and alcohol through yeast fermentation, played an important role in preventing food spoilage by pathogenic microorganisms. In medieval times, there was an increase in size from small 'private' to 'industrial' scale operations.



Only after the development of the 'microscope' by Anthonie van Leeuwenhoek in 1680, could microscopic particles be seen, and it was not until Louis Pasteur's invention in 1870 that an understanding of the role of living microorganisms could begin. About ten years later (1883), the Dane, Hanson, developed a system for the cultivation of pure yeast on an industrial scale, facilitating more controlled brewing. From 1900 onwards, the understanding of the processes in yeast (biochemistry) grew, leading ultimately to a role for enzyme technology in brewing in general.


Raw materials

3.2.1 Malt and adjuncts It was quickly realised that grain needed to be germinated to make more digestible foods and, as is now known, to break down cell wall structures and develop enzymes to modify starch granules to soluble starches. This process is called 'malting'. The remainder of the endosperm cell walls in malt are only present in low quantities, but can have a significant effect on the brewing process. |3-Glucan in barley is usually present at levels of 3–4% (w/w) and due to the germination process is reduced to about 0.5-1 % in the malt. The most important contribution from malt in the brewing process is to deliver fermentable sugars and the maltodextrins. The fermentable sugars are the largest part of the maltderived components and will yield ethanol in the final beer. The maltodextrins are not degraded any further by the malt enzymes and are (partly) responsible for creating some 'mouth feel' in the final beer. Apart from these very important ingredients, malt also delivers a number of other important ingredients such as proteins, lipids, polyphenols and complex Maillard reaction products. The latter are responsible for the typical malt flavour, and for the colour. These can be adapted according to the wishes of the brewer, by modifying the last step in the malting process, which will be described later. Proteins can be divided into two groups. Firstly, the non-catalytically active protein delivers a nutritional element to beer, both for the human consumer, but also, when degraded by enzymes to free amino acids and peptides, for the yeast to serve as a nitrogen source during the growth phase in fermentation. Some particular non-catalytic proteins are responsible for the foaming character of beer and they also contribute to some extent to mouth feel. The second group of proteins are the enzymes, which are catalytically active. They can convert one component into another and are the key topic of this chapter. Polyphenols play a role in the brewing process, as will be discussed later, but also have an impact on colour, mouth feel (astrigency) and stability of the final beer. Lipids play a role during fermentation, as they provide the yeast with membrane material during growth. Otherwise they may impart off-flavour



formation (e.g. trans-2-nonenal), either through auto-oxidation or enzyme catalysed (lipoxygenase) oxidation during the mashing (and malting) process. From all this it can be seen that the understanding of malt, and thus also the malting process, is of key importance. With current knowledge, it is clear that alternative substrates for malt, such as barley, maize, wheat, rice or sorghum may deliver fermentable sugars (or soluble starch), but will not provide the brewer with all the other ingredients. Therefore, the complete omission of malt is rare, and is only done in cases where major constraints exist: for example in some countries in Africa the import of malt is either banned or, through import duties, made extremely expensive. One way to make up for the missing ingredients is to employ commercial enzymes. 5.2.2


Hops are the flower of the female 'Lupulus humulus' plant. In ancient times, they were probably added to the final beer as a type of 'spice', but also served to prolong the shelf life of the brew. Nowadays, hops are usually added early in the brewing process, where they deliver mainly bitterness and flavour. Due to the point of addition, during boiling, the role of enzymes from hops is not significant. 3.2.3 Yeast Although most brewers consider their yeast as a raw material, since it is declared an ingredient on the label of the bottle, it is in fact a processing aid. Raw materials are being consumed (converted), while yeast is growing and is removed from most commercial beers, or it is at least inactivated (pasteurised). In fact, yeast is a biological 'catalyst', a 'living bag of enzymes', which converts the multiple substrates present in wort to the alcohol-containing, flavoursome beer. 3.2.4


Water is normally a source of minerals, which will affect processing and also taste, but which normally have a negligible effect on the performance of enzymes, with the exception of amylase (see section 3.4.3). A more important parameter is the pH of the mash. The aim of the brewer is to work optimally with a mashing pH of around 5.5 (±0.1). 3.2.5 Exogenous enzymes as processing aids In the brewing process a number of processing aids, like fining agents and enzymes, have been used for a long time. The main (traditional) reason is that the enzymes in malt are not always present in sufficient quantities to run the process optimally. Exogenous enzymes, in contrast to endogenous enzymes, are added separately to a particular process step.


ENZYMES IN FOOD TECHNOLOGY Origin of exogenous enzymes Most exogenous enzymes are of microbial origin, although there are two exceptions: ^-amylase from high enzyme malt, and papain, a proteolytic enzyme from the papaya fruit. Production of commercial brewing enzymes The plant-derived enzymes are commercially produced through extraction of the plant material, and subsequent purification, concentration and standardisation (see chapter 10). The microbial enzymes are of bacterial or fungal origin (seldom from yeast) and are produced by means of fermentation. The two methods of fermentation are either submerged, a dispersion of microbial cells in an aqueous medium, or through surface solid state (Koji). This surface culture fermentation is typically performed with fungi (moulds), while submerged fermentation can be undertaken with either bacteria or fungi. The most common bacterial production strain is from the genus Bacillus. Typical enzymes produced with this bacterium are glucanases (less relevant for brewing are the alkaline proteases). Fungal production strains are from the genus Aspergillus (amylase, amyloglucosidase, glucanase and hemicellulase), Trichoderma (glucanase and hemicellulase), Penicillium (glucanase), and Rhizopus (amylase and amyloglucosidase). The name of the enzyme preparation relates to one specific enzyme activity, but commercial non-GMO (genetically modified organism) enzyme preparations are the sum of all proteins, active and inactive, excreted by the microbe. Growth conditions, however, can be chosen such that a particular enzyme activity is predominant. Enzyme activity assay Although most enzyme preparations consist of multiple enzymes, the enzyme assay makes use of the specificity of a typical enzyme. By selecting a purified substrate (e.g. glucan) one can measure only the glucanase activity in the enzyme preparation, as all other enzymes do not act on this substrate. The idea behind these assays is that the correlation between the enzyme assay and the functionality has already been established, so that the often more tedious and laborious functional tests can be avoided. It should be mentioned, however, that not every enzyme assay is standardised. Therefore comparisons between literature data always need to be checked for the assay conditions (e.g. incubation time, pH, temperature) and unit definition. 3.3 The processes of malting and brewing For such an ancient product as beer, the process of brewing is surprisingly complex, beginning with the malting process and followed by the brewing



adjuncts, e.g. maize, rice

glucanase protease amylase xylanase

Bioglucanase Promalt Biofresh

Hitempase Amyloglucosidase Whirlfloc Yeast Food

Biofoam Profix Bi-ox


Figure 3.1 The brewing process. Source: Quest International.

process (see figure 3.1). In modern times, these two processes are generally performed by different companies, despite the close interaction between them. 3.3.1 The malting process In the malting process, kernels of barley grain are wetted (the term for this is 'steeping') which activates the grain to germinate (grow). This activation involves intermittent steps of wetting and aeration, to avoid 'drowning' the grain. It takes about 48 h. The next process step is 'germination', which takes about 4–5 days. The kernels are put on a trough with a perforated floor while continuously humidified air is blown through the bed of grain. Temperatures are kept relatively low (around 15°C), in order to minimise growth of the rootlets and acrospire ('leaf') as this occurs at the expense of energy (starch). The last step (kilning) is the inactivation of the growing kernel, by heating the grains in hot dry air. Depending on the temperature-time regime, more colour and flavour components are formed. It should also be realised that a significant amount of enzymes (among others, |3-glucanase) are from microbial origin, as in all stages of the malting process microbial growth also takes place. The last step performed by the maltsters is the removal of rootlets from the grains. 3.3.2 Malt specification Maltsters and brewers use a large number of malt specifications in order to ensure an optimum brewhouse performance and final beer quality. These quality



specifications are part of delivery contracts used by maltsters and brewers. Usually the quality parameters are estimated with recommended methods, from the Institute of Brewing (IOB), the American Society of Brewing Chemists (ASBC) or the European Brewery Convention (EBC), organisations whose methods show many similarities. Table 3.1 shows the most important parameters used in a typical malt analysis and their significance for the brewing process and final beer quality. The parameters in table 3.1 give a good indication of the general malt quality but are no guarantee of an ideal brewhouse performance because they are mainly based on an average analysis of a whole population of malt kernels. In particular, undermodification of parts of malted barley grains is not always recognisable in modification parameters, and can cause unexpected problems in brewhouse performance. 3.3.3 The brewing process Mashing During mashing, milled malt (also called grist) is added to water (brewing liquor) in order to extract all the components from the grain. Usually the liquor to grist Table 3.1 Malt quality parameters Malt quality parameter


Moisture content

Malt storage potential Pricing of malt

Extract recovery (yield)

Total amount of extractable material (finally amount of beer) likely to be obtained Extract yield Rate of wort separation Rate of final beer filtration

Endosperm cell wall modification friability wort (i-glucan level wort viscosity fine/coarse difference Protein and protein modification total malt protein soluble protein soluble protein in relation to total malt protein (Kolbach) amino acids in wort Wort fermentability, degree of attenuation, limit to which fermentation proceeds Malt enzyme activity diastatic power (combined activity of a- and p-amylase) a-amylase activity p-glucanase activity Wort colour

Foam stability Beer haze (colloidal stability) Yeast food (fermentation) Beer colour Mouth feel Potential alcohol formation Mouth feel, fullness and sweetness of beer Speed and degree of solubilisation of malt solids Brewhouse performance

Beer colour



ratio is 3:1, which leads ultimately, after the various sparging steps, to about 17 kg of malt/hectolitre of beer. Extract recovery (yield) is the most important criterion for success of this process step. Extract recovery is usually about 80% of which approximately two-thirds is suitable for fermentation. As well as these fermentable sugars the extract contains, for example, maltodextrins and protein. The amount of fermentable sugar is related to the so-called 'attenuation' level. This is the limit to which fermentation proceeds. There are a number of ways (temperature regimes) in which this extraction can be undertaken, but it encompasses various enzymatic reactions. These will be discussed later (section 3.4.2). Lautering After the extraction is completed, the insoluble material, or 'spent grain', is separated from the mash. The resultant extract is called 'sweet wort'. Traditionally this is done in a 'Lauter tun', a vessel with a coarse 'sieve' in the bottom (false bottom). This type of separation makes use of the hulls of the malt, which act as a filter aid. It is important that care is taken during milling to ensure that the hull remains intact. Nowadays more breweries are making use of mash filters, whereby the malt can be milled much more finely, as the filterbed function of the grain is no longer required. The use of mash filters results in shorter process times and higher extract recovery. In either case, the mash, containing the highest levels of {3-glucan, results in a retarded extract separation. The remaining extract in the spent grain is washed out with 'sparge water'. The whole process is carried out at about 75°C for 2–5 h. Wort boiling After all the sweet wort has been collected, it is boiled and hops are added. During boiling, some steam is released, also removing particular volatiles such as aldehydes and sulfur components. The high temperature is also required to convert hop acids into the bitter iso-a-acids. The boiling stage takes about 90 min. After boiling the wort, insoluble proteins, polyphenols and (depending on the hop product used) hop solids are removed from the wort in the so-called whirlpool. Subsequently the wort is cooled and oxygenated (aerated). Fermentation The nutrient-rich wort is pumped in a fermenter, and yeast can now be added in order to let the primary fermentation take place. In the first aerobic phase, yeast starts to grow to about four to five times in biomass, after which conditions become anaerobic. This stops the yeast from growing and changes its metabolism into producing ethanol and other volatile components. The primary fermentation finishes when most of the fermentable sugar has been converted, which takes about a week, at a preferred temperature of around 10°C, in the case of a 'lager' fermentation.


ENZYMES IN FOOD TECHNOLOGY Maturation, filtration and clarification At the end of primary fermentation, a large amount of yeast has settled to the bottom of the tank and is taken out first, as part of the yeast will be reused to initiate the next batch of fermentation. This 're-pitching' is done several times (typically 5 to 12 times) depending on the vitality of the separated yeast. The 'green beer' is pumped to a lagering tank, where it is matured. During the maturation phase, some components, like diacetyl, will be converted by the remaining yeast to more preferred compounds. Traditionally the lagering could take several months, but nowadays it can be reduced to days. After this process, the remainder of yeast cells are removed ('fined') and the beer is usually (colloidally) stabilised upon filtration by removing proteins and/or polyphenols by respectively silica and/or PVPP. This conditioned beer is collected in so-called 'bright beer tanks', in order to be checked on quality, before it is bottled. 3.4

Enzymes in the brewing process

3.4,1 Enzymes in malting During the malting process the enzymes native to the barley (amylases, glucanases, proteases and hemicellulases) are activated. As a result the malted barley is made more amenable to milling and starch/carbohydrate extraction. The structure of the barley grain and the enzymes involved in the breakdown of its constituents are shown in figure 3.2. Apart from the endogenous enzymes present in malt (and barley), no exogenous enzymes are applied in the malting process. The key target of the maltster is to generate a well-modified, homogeneous malt. The modification relates to the enzymatic conversion of the endosperm. As the enzymes are released through the aleurone layer, it will be clear that the modification gradually moves on through the endosperm as germination time progresses. The maltster has to find an optimal limit for the extent the modification (germination) proceeds, as this occurs at the expense of valuable sugars for the germinating kernel and thus of the yield of this process. The homogeneity of the malt relates partly to the modification process in the grain kernel, but is also dictated by the size of the operation. The germination and the kilning stages of the process suffer particularly from the physical differences a kernel encounters at the top of the bed of grain or on the bottom. The main differences in the germination bed are gradual changing levels of oxygen and carbon dioxide and to a lesser extent temperature. During kilning it is mainly a temperature gradient affecting the 'kill rate' of the germinating grain and the concomitant colour formation (Maillard). The consequence of all this, plus different agricultural conditions is that by definition malt is not a homogenous product, despite all efforts of the maltster to make it so.

Figure 3.2 Structure of the barley grain and the enzymes involved in the breakdown of its constituents.



3.4.2 Enzymes in mashing During the malting process some enzymes have already been active in degrading the various polymeric substrates, such as starch, glucan, protein and many more low molecular weight components (e.g. oil). However, particularly in case of undermodified malt or low quality heterogeneous malt, exogenous (added) enzymes such as proteases, amylases and glucanases can help to increase the degradation of these polymeric substrates. The most important benefit of using exogenous enzymes is that they give the brewer the required tolerance in using his malt, particularly as the mashing process is a more homogenous process than malting (see section 3.4.1). Protein converting enzymes Mashing usually starts with the degradation of malt protein (about 10% w/w in malt) by means of proteases and peptidases, as a result of their lower thermostability compared to the other enzymes involved. Therefore lower temperatures (e.g. 45-55°C) are usually applied at this stage. These enzymes are referred to respectively as exo- and endo-protease and produce, respectively, free amino acids and peptides (oligomeric amino acids), and smaller proteins (thereby making them more soluble). This process step is also referred to as 'the proteolytic stand'. During the malting process some protein degradation has already taken place, but particularly in the case of undermodified malt (or low quality heterogeneous malt), exogenous enzymes can help to increase the free amino nitrogen (FAN), which is required during fermentation as the nitrogen source for the yeast. However, some care should be taken in applying excessive protein degradation, as this can cause excessive colour formation (through the Maillard reaction), and may affect the foam potential of the final beer. Cell wall degrading enzymes Degradation of cell walls (in good malt 1% (w/w), of which about 75% is P-glucan and 25% is hemicellulose, also called xylan or pentosan), is carried out by glucanases. The main problem with incomplete cell wall degradation, as is the case with heterogeneous and/or undermodified malt, is the negative impact these polysaccharides can have on the mash filtration (lautering) and beer filtration process steps, and also on the colloidal stability (haze) of the final beer. The most important polysaccharide to degrade is fi-glucan. This polymer contributes most to the viscosity of wort, and in beer it has the tendency to form insoluble complexes. Xylan is usually already sufficiently degraded in the malt. Any residual xylan will also be degraded by the side activities present in commercial glucanase preparations. Barley (malt) glucan consists mainly of (3 1–4 glucose units, interspersed with ^ 1-3 linkages (see figure 3.3). The



Figure 3.3 Barley glucan degradation. (a) schematic; (b) practical viscosity reduction at 60°C. Source: Quest International.

commercial j3-glucanases contain activities to degrade this type of glucan and are therefore called |3 1-3,1-4 glucanase. As can be seen from table 3.2, malt glucanases are less temperature-stable than microbial enzymes. Fungal glucanases are seen to be the most stable in the relevant pH range. 3.4,2.3 Starch-converting enzymes Complete starch conversion (in malt about 60% (w/w) of which about 25% is amylose and 75% is amylopectin) is carried out by a range of amylolytic enzymes. Amylose consists of glucose units linked through a 1-4 linkages, while amylopectin also has a 1-6 linkages, making it into a branched polymer (see figure 3.4). The amylolytic enzymes in malt are a-amylase, (3-amylase and limit dextrinase. From microbial origin, the enzymes pullulanase (the much more



Table 3.2 Characteristics of some typical fi-glucanases

pH optimum range Temperature optimum range Degrades: barley fi-glucan laminarin CMC lichenin


Barley malt

B. subtilis

Asp. orzyes

Asp. niger

4.5-5.3 40–45

4.5-7.0 45-50

4.0–6.0 45-55

3.0–6.0 45–65

+ + + +

+ — +

+ + + +

+ + + +

Source: Quest International.

Figure 3.4 Starch hydrolysis.

stable microbial equivalent of limit dextnnase) and amyloglucosidase can be added (see figure 3.4). a-Amylase splits the polymer in an 'endo-' manner, and therefore leaves a considerable amount of branched maltodextrins from amylopectin. ^-amylase splits only maltose units from the (non-reducing) end of the polymer (exo-activity). It can act on both amylose and amylopectin, but stops if it encounters an a 1-6 link. While fi-amylase is less stable than a-amylase, limit dextnnase is even less stable. Its activity, as the name suggests, relates to the degradation of the partially hydrolysed amylopectin remaining after the a-amylase degradation. It does not act on single a 1-6 linked glucose units, but requires at least an a 1 -4 linked glucose on each side of the a 1-6 link. As this enzyme is not able to operate at temperatures of 60ºC



and higher, amyloglucidase is often used to increase the fermentability of wort. Amyloglucosidase (or also called glucoamylase) consists of both a 1-4 and an a 1-6 cleaving activity, but only acts in an 'exo-' manner. This stage of the mashing process is often referred to as the 'saccharification stage'. Some typical differences between the various types of ot-amylases are shown in table 3.3. Apart from the previously mentioned analysis of the enzyme activities, the performance of the enzymes is also measured on a laboratory scale (EBC methods), analysing starch degradation (iodine staining and fermentability), glucan degradation (wort viscosity, mash filtration and staining) and protein degradation [free amino nitrogen (FAN) analysis], as shown in figure 3.5. The complete mashing process can take 2 to 4 hours.

Table 3.3 Properties of amylases for commercial application

Amylase type pH optimum range pH stability range Temperature optimum range (°C) Effective temperature range (°C)

A. oryzae

B. subtilis

Barley malt

a-amylase 4.8-5.8 5.5-8.5 45-55 Up to 60

a-amylase 5.0–7.0 4.8-8.5 60-70 Up to 90

ot-amylase 4.0–5.8 4.9-9.1 50-65 Up to 70



a-amylase 6.0–7.0 7.0–8.8 45-55 Up to 55

Source: Quest International.

Figure 3.5 Laboratory brewing optimisation trials. Source: Quest International.



3.4.3 Enzymes in adjunct cooking As mentioned before, adjuncts are applied in brewing as they are a relatively cheap alternative of fermentable extract compared to barley malt. Most common sources are maize, rice, barley or wheat. All these cereals require the use of starch degrading enzymes, or else a sugar syrup (an acidic starch hydrolysate) should be used. The drawback of these sugar syrups is that they may have a slowing effect on the fermentation, due to an unbalanced sugar composition. The most optimal enzyme is a bacterial (Bacillus) a-amylase which is heat stable and does not generate many free sugars, which would otherwise have an adverse effect on fermentation. The application of this type of enzyme is particularly suitable when the source of starch is other than barley (e.g. maize, rice, sorghum); the gelatinisation temperature of these starches is between 68º and 80°C whereas that of barley is around 63°C. The most stable enzyme is derived from B. licheniformis (performance up to 105 C), while the enzyme from B. subtilis has 'intermediate' stability (performance up to 80ºC). These enzymes require a minimum of 50 ppm of calcium in the mash water. In the case of barley brewing, the same enzymes are required as in regular malt mashing (i.e. proteolytic, glucanolytic and amylolytic activities). Indeed, one could consider barley brewing as an extreme case of brewing with undermodified malt. Often the high thermostable amylases are used for the starch conversion. 3.4.4 Enzymes in lautering/mash filtration Lautering and other forms of mash filtration are usually performed at so-called 'mashing-off' temperatures of 75–78°C. As can be seen in table 3.4, almost all malt enzymes are already inactivated at these temperatures. Only a small amount of residual a-amylase activity will be present where a relatively lowmash filtration temperature is used. During sparging of the spent grains in the filterbed, water at 75-78 C is used, the higher temperature being preferred because of reduced wort viscosity, increased rate of wort separation and to some extent increased extract recovery. If large quantities of adjunct or undermodified malt are used, starch may be released late in the mashing cycle. The amylolytic enzymes only show a limited amount of activity at this stage during mashing; this could result in starch polymers being carried over into the filtered wort, especially if using sparging

Table 3.4 Inactivation of malt enzymes Malt enzyme

Inactivation temperature ( C)

P-Glucanase Proteases p-Amylase a-Amylase

55 70 68-70 75-78



water at temperatures above 75°C (where a-amylase is rapidly inactivated). Lower sparging temperatures could minimise these problems but would have a negative effect on such factors as wort viscosity. Addition of thermostable exogenous a-amylase during mashing can reduce this wort-starch problem. At the same time it allows the brewer to use higher sparging temperatures with the accompanying benefits. 3.4.5 Enzymes in fermentation The wort to which the pitching yeast will be pitched (to start fermentation) has no enzyme activity. The boiling process has inactivated all enzyme activity, either malt derived or from exogenous sources. Through enzyme activity within yeast cells, sugar molecules (DP < 4) are taken up and in the anaerobic phase transformed into ethanol and carbon dioxide and amino acids are transformed into yeast proteins and some flavour components, e.g. phenyl ethanol. Wort components such as dextrins, (3-glucan and soluble proteins are not metabolised by strains of brewer's yeast. Exogenous enzymes, apart from the application areas described below, are used in fermentation to help prevent difficulties occurring later in the process. In case of beer filtration problems, |3-glucanase can be added to the fermenter (or during maturation), degrading residual glucans which would otherwise cause the filters to block. Another area for enzyme application during fermentation is to reduce haze problems in the final beer. After analysing the type of haze material (which can be done using enzymes), fungal a-amylase or j3-glucanase (for respectively starch or glucan haze) can be applied. Low calorie beer production Since the malt-derived limit-dextrinase is not very temperature stable, a large amount of non-fermentable dextrins will be present in finished beer (typically 2.4% in Pilsener beer), as brewer's yeast is not able to convert these branched maltodextrins. Together with other beer components such as proteins, these dextrins are responsible for the mouth feel and fullness of the beer and also contribute heavily to its caloric value. Low calorie beer can be produced with the application of exogenous amyloglucosidase during fermentation, which will degrade dextrins to fermentable sugars. In this way normal alcohol/low dextrin beer can be made from wort containing a reduced amount of extract. One step further is the production of low alcohol or non-alcohol low calorie beer where the application of exogenous amyloglucosidase is combined with the fermentation of low extract-containing wort or with removal of alcohol, for example by vacuum distillation. Hanging fermentation Lager fermentation of 5% alcohol beer usually takes 6 to 10 days. After this period the beer will only contain a small amount of residual fermentable



extract which will be fermented during maturation. In the fermentation, the sugars glucose, maltose, maltotriose and sucrose are fermented, while maltodextrins with more than three glucose units cannot be fermented. A typical profile of fermentable sugars in 12°Plato wort (5% alcohol beer) is given below in table 3.5. One of the most troublesome problems for a brewer is that of 'hanging' fermentations where complete attenuation is not reached within normal fermentation time (or even not at all). Hanging fermentations can be caused by a number of factors: •

• •

unbalanced wort carbohydrate spectrum; too small an amount of fermentable sugars as a result of incomplete enzymatic saccharification during mashing, usually related to the use of adjuncts or undermodified malt failure of the yeast, although still in suspension, to utilise all the fermentable wort sugars, usually due to the yeast's inability to take up and metabolise maltotriose, and believed to be the result of a spontaneous mutation which can occur in most brewing strains deficiency of yeast nutrients like amino acids or zinc (especially related to adjunct brewing) premature flocculation of the yeast culture in the fermenting wort.

The problem of an unbalanced wort carbohydrate composition can be controlled during fermentation with the help of exogenous a-amylase (acting on a-1-4 bonds) which will correct a possible incomplete saccharification during the mashing process. Exogenous amyloglucosidase may also be used to save batches of beer if the problem of the inability to metabolise maltotriose (yeast mutation) occurs. Maltotriose will then be degraded to smaller sugars, and these can be fermented subsequently. A possible shortage of amino acids (yeast food) can be overcome in the brewhouse by ensuring a better protein breakdown in the mashing cycle, either by prolonged protease rests at the start of mashing or the use of exogenous exo-peptidases.

Table 3.5 Carbohydrate composition of 12 Plato wort Sugar Fructose Glucose Maltose Sucrose Maltotriose Dextrins

% in won


0.1–0.2 0.9-1.3 5.8–6.8 0.2–0.4 1.4–1.7 1.9–2.4

+ + 4-4+ -



3.4.6 Enzymes in maturation Enzymes to correct problems (filtration and beer haze) Exogenous enzymes can correct incomplete degradation of starches and glucans causing beer filtration problems or haze problems in the final beer. This was described in section 3.4.5 for enzymes in fermentation, but exogenous enzymes can also be used during maturation. The point of addition is best upon transfer to the maturation tank, so that the mixing of the enzyme is controlled. Enhanced maturation with acetolactate decarboxylase (ALDC) As mentioned before, a number of conversions resulting in flavour changes are taking place during maturation. One of the aims of maturation is to 'reabsorb' diacetyl, which is considered a (buttery) off-flavour in lager beer. This component is produced by the yeast during the main fermentation. The spontaneous conversion of the precursor a-acetolacate into diacetyl is particularly slow. This reaction can be speeded up by raising the temperature at the end of the primary fermentation, but this will also increase the rate of other reactions, some of which are undesirable (related to yeast stress, e.g. autolysis). Therefore a microbial enzyme (Bacillus) was developed to convert a-acetolactate into acetoin, before it can be converted into diacetyl. This enzyme is called a-acetolactate decarboxylase (ALDC). The relevant transformations are depicted in figure 3.6. 3.4.7 Chill proofing enzymes If no preventive actions are taken, beer will loose its clarity quite quickly. Apart from the earlier mentioned glucan hazes (permanent haze), so called 'chill haze'

Yeast cell

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