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Betaine is a non-essential nutrient which performs several important physiological functions in organisms. Abundant data exist to suggest that betaine has a potential for prevention of chronic diseases and that its dietary intake may contribute to overall health enhancement. Several studies have pointed out that the betaine status of the general population is inadequate and have suggested nutritional strategies to improve dietary intake of betaine. Cereal-based food has been implicated as the major source of betaine in the Western diet. This review summarizes the results on the betaine content in various cereals and related products. Attention has been given to the betaine content in gluten-free grains and products. It also discusses the stability of betaine during processing (cooking, baking, extrusion) and possibilities to increase betaine content by fortification.

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The demand for ready-to-use functional foods is high, which encourages manufacturers to develop new, nutritionally valuable products. As an excellent source of biologically active compounds, beetroot (Beta vulgaris L.) is considered to have highly beneficial effects on health. This research aimed to evaluate the impact of replacing spelt flour (SF) with 15%, 20% and 25% beetroot powder (BP). The physicochemical and functional properties of biscuits baked at different temperatures (150 and 170 °C) were followed at the beginning, and after 3 and 6 months of storage as standard conditions. Moisture content and water activity (aw) gave insight into the biscuits’ shelf life. The value of aw from 0.35 to 0.56 indicated appropriate storability. Dietary fiber content in fresh biscuits ranged from 6.1% to 7.6%, protein from 9.2% to 8.9% and sugar from 30.6% to 35.9%. The content of betalain, total polyphenols and flavonoids, and antioxidant activity (DPPH, FRAP) increased with beetroot powder content incorporated. A slight decrease of all the mentioned parameters during the storage indicated satisfied retention of bioactive molecules. The content of prevalent phenolic compounds gallic and protocatechuic acid, identified by HPLC, decreased from 22.2–32.0 and 21.1–24.9 in fresh biscuits to 18.3–23.4 and 17.3–20.3 mg/100 g upon six months of storage, respectively. An increase of the L* and a* and a decrease of the b* coordinate values, compared with the control sample without beetroot values, was noticed as well as the expected level of their change during the storage. The obtained results indicated that biscuits enriched with beetroot powder showed a significantly improved functional, nutritional and antioxidant potential during storage.

The main purposes of this work are successful modeling of twin‐screw extrusion process using predictive models, investigating the effect of process parameters such as screw speed, feed rate, and feed moisture content on the process and product responses and finally optimizing the process regarding betaine content in the extruded product and energy consumption. The second order polynomial approximation models and the artificial neural network were developed to predict the betaine content, showing the high accuracy in the prediction of experimental results. This study introduces the multiobjective optimization (MOO) approach in the extrusion process of spelt flour. The maximal betaine content (between 1,506.8 and 1,605.2 mg/40 g) and minimal energy consumption (between 101.3 and 108.5 W hr/kg) were indicated by MOO procedure, which were gained using the following input parameters: feed flow rate feed about 24 kg/h, screw speed about 252 RPM and moisture content from 21.6 to 23.4%. Practical applications This study introduces the multiobjective optimization (MOO) approach in the extrusion process of spelt flour, which provides the selection of optimal solution that enables the extruder to reach the optimum conditions of the process and provide decision maker with deeper understanding of the process. The present study analyzes the influence of extrusion cooking parameters like: screw speed, feed flow rate, and feed moisture content on the betaine content in the extrudate product and specific mechanical energy input during the processing of betaine enriched spelt flour based extrudates. One way to improve the intake of betaine in the general population can be to enrich foods with betaine. According to European Breakfast Cereal Association for extruded products portion sizes should be 40 g. Consuming a portion of a functional extrudate product with the addition of betaine (1,500 mg/day) could give expected health effects. Final extrudate product from this study satisfies these statements.

BACKGROUND In concomitance with shifts in climate conditions in recent years, an increasingly frequent emergence of Aspergillus flavus and aflatoxins in cereals has been observed. In this study the effects of temperature (15, 23, 30 and 37 °C) and water activity (aw) (0.85, 0.90, 0.95 and 0.99) on aflatoxin B1 (AFB1) production by A. flavus isolate inoculated on hull‐less and hulled spelt grains were investigated. RESULTS The optimal conditions for AFB1 biosynthesis were reached at 30 °C and aw value of 0.99 in the all tested samples (hull‐less grains, dehulled spelt grains and hulls). The AFB1 accumulation was significantly higher in hull‐less than in dehulled grains, that implicated a protective effect of spelt hulls. The levels of AFB1 were about 10–170 times higher in hulls than in grains. In order to determine the possibility of predicting the occurrence of AFB1 under different storage conditions mathematical models [second order polynomial (SOP) and artificial neural network (ANN)] were applied. CONCLUSION The achievement of such estimation facilitates further decisions on continuous monitoring of the potential hazard related to AFB1 contamination of stored spelt‐based food. The knowledge of the storage temperature and aw effects on the AFB1 content in spelt during the postharvest phase is of great practical importance. © 2019 Society of Chemical Industry

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Effects of climate change, global trade and technological changes in processing industries cause higher occurrence of Aspergillus flavus and aflatoxin B1 (AFB1) in cereal crops. Four Triticum species: common wheat (Triticum aestivum L.), spelt (T. aestivum ssp. spelta L.), Khorasan wheat (Triticum turgidum ssp. turanicum Jakubz.) and hybrid wheat (T. aestivum L.– F1) were examined for their response to A. flavus infection and production of AFB1. The grains were obtained from control and artificially field inoculated wheat with A. flavus isolates (No. 1 and No. 2) in the 2016 vegetation season in the region of Vojvodina (Northern province of Serbia). Spelt wheat showed the strongest response to the infection in comparison to other analysed wheat species due to specific physico-chemical characteristics of the hull. The weakest response to A. flavus infections was noted in Khorasan wheat. The highest AFB1 level (256 μg/kg) was observed in the dehulled spelt grains, in comparison to other species where the AFB1 in dehulled grains was not detected. The levels of AFB1 in spelt were about three times higher in hulls (648 and 97.3 μg/kg, respectively) in comparison to grains (256 and 30.7 μg/kg, respectively) in two inoculation treatments (A. flavus No. 1 and No. 2, respectively). In order to investigate the impact of wheat hulls on development of A. flavus, including the biosynthesis of toxic fungal metabolites, physico-chemical and structural properties of different Triticum spp. hulls were characterised. The highest value of the water absorption index and total dietary fibre were observed in spelt hulls in comparison to other wheat species. Additionally, the height value distribution of the fossilized stomatal apparatus of hulls indicates the diversity of spelt wheat compared to other wheat species.