How to get fresh (and stay fresh) with consumers
September 2006
As market prices continue to rise due to the ever-increasing petrol price and current exchange rate fluctuations, the baking industry seeks alternatives to cut costs and increase profit margins – while still maintaining quality. Even in this economic scenario, there are ways for bakers to maintain (or even improve) quality while still keeping costs down.

For consumers, freshness means more than extended shelf life (ESL) – they want the full sensation of mouthfeel, softness, moistness and consistency. However, freshness comes at a cost – bakeries face stale returns in excess of 20%.

The solution: use an enzyme that extends shelf life, while providing all the qualities that people enjoy in baked goods.

A new amylase released by AB Enzymes shows a significant extension to shelf life, as well as preserving freshness by maintaining a marked softness and moistness, which further enhances taste. It also maintains crumb softness and moistness with sustained crumb resilience.

This amylase, VERON^® Amylofresh, although initially developed for wheat products, works exceptionally well in sweet dough – and has been found to be superior to comparable enzymes in the market. Amylofresh doubles the shelf life of baked goods such as doughnuts, brioches, cakes and muffins. In addition, the enzyme develops (and maintains) a delicious, luscious taste of freshness in these baked goods.

In a controlled trial, 45 testers were asked to compare sandwich bread made with Amylofresh to a comparable enzyme. At three, seven and ten days, testers found the Amylofresh product to be consistently superior in terms of fresh taste.



Amylofresh has also proven more economical and convenient. It modifies the starch fraction of the flour and can be added either: to the flour directly, to the baking improvers or to the dough in the production process. It lowers production costs by decreasing ingredient quantities while ensuring consistent results.



Fibre – a sticky matter
In fibre-rich dough the percentage of regular wheat flour is reduced. The swelling and water absorption properties of the doughs are changed which results in slack and sticky dough properties, which can result in bread with inferior quality. In the majority of cases vital wheat gluten is added which to solve the problem, but this increases costs significantly. AB Enzymes have developed the VERON^® HF to specifically address this problem. It is an enzyme combination with xylanase and transglutaminase activity.

The xylanase activity hydrolyses high-molecular-weight pentosans into smaller fragments, which results in improved swelling properties with reduced dough stickiness. Furthermore they interact with the gluten enhancing the gas-holding properties, which has a positive effect on dough stability and bread volume. Xylanases can also prevent post-stiffening that can occasionally be found when using certain fibre materials or higher rye flour contents.

The transglutaminase activity in VERON^® HF has a distinct stabilising effect on those ‘difficult to handle’ dough systems. In contrast to most technical enzymes, that mainly effect hydrolysis, transglutaminase creates new bonds between amino acids. It catalyses an acyl transfer reaction between the amino acids lysine and glutamine, thus linking peptide chains and stabilising the protein structure. Therefore, the need to add vital wheat gluten to variety bread formulations is not always required.

Better Noodles and Pasta
AB Enzymes have also developed an enzyme formulation for improved noodle and pasta products. The enzyme complex - VERON^® NDL - has both hemicellulitic and lipolytic properties. This raises the overcooking tolerance of noodles and improves the firmness (“bite”) of cooked noodles. The resulting product is also more aesthetic, being whiter with reduced speckiness. In the case of deep fried instant noodles, there is lower oil absorption which results in a cost saving through lower raw material expenditure.





With consumers demanding greater variety and enhanced freshness, enzymes have an important role to play in terms of quality, cost and the delivery of the ultimate fresh experience.