Improvement of baked wheat chips quality by protease-mediated enzymatic hydrolysis of wheat flour.

Nowadays, new snacks using alternative raw materials and ingredients are the critical driving forces for the snack food industry development. Wheat is an abundant cereal resource with the potential for chips making. In the present study, protease-treated wheat flour improved the quality of wheat chips by weakening the gluten strength of dough and reducing the chips' hardness from 6019 ± 306 N to 785 ± 200 N. The optimal enzymatic hydrolysis parameters were established as 1.44 × 104 U bromelain/100 g flour at 50 °C for 60 min. Bromelain significantly reduced the polymeric proteins content (from 15.81 ± 0.52% to 0.82 ± 0.03%) and glutenin macropolymer (GMP, from 14.95 ± 0.23% to 2.06 ± 0.05%), swelling power, gelatinization enthalpy (from 8.82 ± 0.39 to 7.31 ± 0.27 J/g), and viscosities, but increased the solubility (from 3.9 ± 0.1% to 12.8 ± 0.7%) of wheat flour. Moreover, protease hydrolysis significantly decreased the elastic modulus and viscous modulus (P < 0.05); values and the gluten network in the protease-treated dough showed different degradation degrees. The reconstituted wheat chips proved that GMP was the main factor affecting the chip hardness. The present study suggests that protease hydrolysis, especially bromelain, has great potential as a flour modification technology for producing baked wheat chips. • Wheat flour treated with protease improved the quality of wheat chips. • The optimal enzymatic hydrolysis parameters were: 1.44 × 104 U/100 g flour at 50 °C for 60 min. • Protease hydrolysis weakened the gluten strength and changed the starch properties. • Bromelain showed stronger hydrolytic effect on wheat proteins and rheological properties. • Glutenin macropolymer played a key role in the hardness of wheat chips. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]