Isolation and characterization of starch from industrial fresh pasta by-product and its potential use in sugar-snap cookie making.

In this paper, starch was extracted from fresh pasta by-product (PS) and its chemical composition and physical and microscopic characteristics were determined. Commercial wheat starch (CS) was used as reference. In general, purity was similar between starches studied. However, others compounds such as protein, lipid and ash were significantly different. PS starch granules had large lenticular-shape (25-33 μm) and small spherical-shape (5-8 μm). The pH and color of PS starch were similar to those reported for CS starch. On the other hand, PS had higher water absorption capacity, viscosity and cooking stability than CS. The gelatinization temperature of PS was similar to that of CS (60 and 61 °C). At high temperature (90 °C) both starches had similar rheological behavior. The results achieved suggest that PS starch has potential for application in food systems requiring high processing temperatures such the manufacture of sugar snap cookie. The effects of PS starch addition on the dough making stage and the final cookie quality were analyzed. Improvements in dough cohesiveness (24 %) and springiness (10 %) were significant relative to those of CS dough. Texture profile analysis confirmed the rheological changes.