Wheat Quality and Its Effect on Bread Staling

Abstract

Wheat is a very popular crop in all over the world due to the various use of wheat flour as staple foods, such as bread. As many food products are made from wheat, the property of wheat can be a determinant of the quality of final food products. Staled bread is not harmful to health but is normally rejected by consumers due to the absence of desirable sensory attributes. The phenomena of staling can be increased hardness of bread, the migration of moisture from center of bread to the crust of bread, loss of flavor and etc. The exact mechanism of staling has not been established completely. To delay or prevent staling, either addition of anti-staling agent, such as surfactant and enzyme or modification of wheat component, such as wheat starch has been adapted. The development of waxy wheat made it possible to reconstitute the starch component in bread. When the content of amylopectin was increased in bread, the loss of moisture was decreased and the reduction in softness of bread was decreased during storage. Increased retrogradation of starch did not always accompany the staling of bread indicating that the retrogradation of starch may not be a single indicator of bread staling. To find out the exact relationship between bread staling and starch retrogradation, further research is necessary.