Comparison of wheat, soybean, rice, and pea protein properties for effective applications in food products

Abstract

Pea and rice proteins are promising to substitute allergenic proteins, and increasingly, play important roles in the food industry because of their hypoallergenic characteristics and nutritional value. However, manufacturers generally provide limited functionality information on these proteins. Therefore, this study comprehensively compared functional properties of wheat, soybean, rice, and pea proteins for their industrial applications and illustrated correlation among various functionalities. Results showed that protein solubility (PS) was highly related to its water absorption (WA) capacity, emulsifying activity index (EAI), and emulsion stability index (ESI). The overall functionality of pea protein was close to that of soybean protein while rice protein cannot match with all other proteins. sodium dodecyl sulfate–polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (SDS‐PAGE) analysis indicated the composition of each protein was unique. While the deconvolution of the amide I band of the Raman spectra indicated soybean and pea proteins that shared similar features, but they were different from that of wheat and rice proteins. Practical applications Due to the allergenicity of wheat and soybean proteins, food manufacturers are looking for alternative protein sources. Rice and Pea proteins are promising substitutes because of their “allergen‐friendly” as well as their emergence in the food market. This study provided a comprehensive comparison of the functionality of commercially available wheat, soybean, rice, and pea proteins. The information presented in this study would be helpful to food scientists, scholars, or engineers when they develop appropriate application of various proteins in food products.

Effects of different emulsifier substitutes on artisanal ice cream quality

“…RPC showed the best emulsifying capacity among the plant protein-based ingredients and the highest CS (Table 2). This is in contrast with the results by Zhao, Shen, Wu, Zhang, and Xu (2020), who reported a very low EAI for rice proteins in comparison with soybean and pea proteins, probably due to the very low solubility of their rice protein concentrate at pH 7. In fact, Mun, Shin, and Kim (2016) demonstrated that solubility of rice proteins depends on the rice cultivar used for the extraction and emulsifying properties are affected not only by protein solubility but also by other properties, such as the amino acid composition and the hydrophilic-lipophilic balance.…”

“…RPC_F mix showed a density value significantly higher than that of REF (Table 4). Thus, it is presumable that the used rice proteins had low foaming capacity, as observed also by Zhao et al (2020) for a different commercial product, resulting in a denser ice cream mix. The significantly lower value of Brix degree was probably due to the interference of some RPC components during the analysis with the digital refractometer.…”

Pea protein ingredients: A mainstream ingredient to (re)formulate innovative foods and beverages.

“…Through incorporation into staple food, pea protein ingredients could offer opportunities to enhance the protein content in the diet while providing some functionality (binder, emulsifier, stabilizer or extender) to the formulation (Zhao, Shen, Wu, Zhang, & Xu, 2020). This section aims to provide a better understanding of the impacts of pea protein on array of products (bread, pasta, baked goods, snacks, meat products and beverage) as summarized in Table 2.…”

The role of emergent processing technologies in tailoring plant protein functionality: New insights

“…In turn, their solubility is increased as the system's pH moves away from the isoelectric point (Bessada, Barreira, & Oliveira, 2019;Karaca et al, 2011;Shevkani et al, 2019). Recently, Zhao, Shen, Wu, Zhang, and Xu (2020) studied the pH related solubility of distinct plant proteins, i.e., pea, soybean, wheat and rice. Their isoelectric point was estimated to be around pH 4-6, 4-5 and 6-7 for pea, soybean and wheat, respectively, at which protein precipitation was almost complete.…”