Maryam Bahram-Parvar
Postdoctoral fellow, University of Guelph, Canada
Title: Novel intrumental analytical methods for quality control of frozen desserts – A review
Biography
Biography: Maryam Bahram-Parvar
Abstract
Physico-chemical analyses are commonly used for measuring quality aspects of ice cream and related products. However, these methods are time consuming, need large quantity of sample and lots of pollutant reagents, and in some cases, obtain limited knowledge of proporties of the products. Consequently, the is a growing demand of the food industries and research institues to have new means of measurements with higher capabilites. Alternative techniques have been introduced to characterize frozen desserts, as complex foods, including rheometry, spectroscopy, X-ray, electro-analytical techniques, ultrasound, and laser, however their application is few. This review discusses the potential of destructive and non-destructive methodologies in determining the quality and characteristics of ice cream and similar products, such as emulsions and foams. Determining the interfacial properties, droplet size distribution, influence of formulation on ice cream structure, and thermo-mechanical properties, visualization of the 3D microstructure, control of freezing, detection of microbial concentration, quantification of different populations of protein in an emulsified system, etc. are of potential applications of novel techniques in ice cream testing. Some of the techniques have demonstrated considerable potential for transferring to the dairy plants as either on- or in-line methods and may be applied nondestructively. However, an accurate determination of the quality and/or identity of frozen dessert seem feasible only when a combination of all parameters is considered and different tests are used.