Gluten Free Pasta from Green Bananas

“There was no sig­nif­i­cant dif­fer­ence between the mod­i­fied pasta and stan­dard sam­ples in terms of appear­ance, aroma, fla­vor, and over­all qual­ity,” reports lead inves­ti­ga­tor Renata Puppin Zandonadi, PhD, Department of Nutrition, University of Brazil. “Green bananas are con­sid­ered a sub-product of low com­mer­cial value with lit­tle indus­trial use. For banana grow­ers and pasta prod­uct mak­ers, there is the pos­si­bil­ity of diver­si­fy­ing and expand­ing their market.”

Researchers com­pared a stan­dard whole-wheat pasta prepa­ra­tion made from whole wheat flour and whole eggs with one made from green banana flour, egg whites, water, and gums. The alter­ations reduced the fat con­tent and increased the pro­tein value of the mod­i­fied pasta, impor­tant because gluten removal typ­i­cally reduces some pro­teins respon­si­ble for some sen­sory char­ac­ter­is­tics of pasta prod­ucts. The egg whites and gum result in pasta that is less sticky than typ­i­cal gluten-free pas­tas, and pro­mote firm­ness, elas­tic­ity, mois­ture, and uniformity.

The mod­i­fied pasta decreased fat con­tent by over 98%. This reduc­tion is par­tic­u­larly impor­tant to patients with celiac dis­ease, because many gluten-free prod­ucts com­pen­sate for the removal of gluten with high lev­els of lipid content.

Fifty testers who did not have celiac dis­ease and 25 celiac dis­ease patients com­pared the pas­tas. In both groups, the mod­i­fied pasta was bet­ter accepted than the stan­dard in aroma, fla­vor, tex­ture, and over­all qual­ity, indi­cat­ing that the prod­uct can pos­si­bly be com­mer­cial­ized to a wider mar­ket than just those with celiac disease.

The mod­i­fied pasta had a high quan­tity of resis­tant starch, which may help con­trol glycemic indexes, cho­les­terol, intesti­nal reg­u­lar­ity, and fer­men­ta­tion by intesti­nal bac­te­ria. “Considering that untreated celiac dis­ease pro­motes can­cer in intesti­nal cells and a highly inflam­ma­tory mucosal sta­tus, devel­op­ing gluten-free prod­ucts with bioac­tive com­pounds such as the ones present in green banana flour is impor­tant for celiac dis­ease patients,” con­cludes Dr. Zandonadi. “Patients will ben­e­fit from ingest­ing a prod­uct with a bet­ter nutri­tional pro­file made from an ingre­di­ent that is pro­duced and con­sumed through­out the world.”

In an accom­pa­ny­ing video, Raquel Braz Assunção Botelho, PhD, dis­cusses the poten­tial ben­e­fits of green banana flour-based pasta for peo­ple with celiac disease.

Source: Elsevier Release