Relationship between wheat flour characteristic and sponge cake-making performance

MALENA MOIRAGHI; ESTHER DE LA HERA; GABRIELA PÉREZ; MANUEL GOMEZ

Milan

Conferencia; 2nd ISEKI Conference; 2011

ISEKI

This work studied the association between sponge cake quality, solvent retention capacity (SRC) profile and flour physicochemical characteristics using 38 soft wheat samples from different origin in order to select the flour parameters stronger related to cake-making performance. Particle size average, protein, damaged starch, water soluble pentosans, total pentosans, solvent retention capacities profile and pasting properties were analyzed. Sponge cake volume and crumb texture were measured to evaluated cake quality. Cluster analysis was applied to assess differences in flour quality parameters among wheat lines based on the SRC profile. Cluster number was arbitrarily set to 3. Cluster 1 grouped 20 wheat samples; on cluster 2 there were 17 wheat samples; and only one sample was separated in cluster 3 which presented the worst cake-making performance. Cluster 1 showed significantly higher sponge cake volume and crumb softness, smaller particle size values, lower SRC sucrose, SRC carbonate and SRC water, damaged starch and protein content. Significant negative correlations were found between SCV and particle size, damaged starch, protein content, viscosity at 40 ºC and 55 ºC and SRC parameters while total pentosans and pasting temperature correlated positively. The negative correlations between cake volume and SRC parameters and the results found on the cluster analysis indicate that flours with smaller particle size, lower absorption capacity and higher pasting temperature had better cake-making performance.