Baking Technology and Nutrition

Towards a Healthier World

Stanley P. Cauvain, Rosie H. Clark

• Publisher: Wiley
• Year: 2019
• Print ISBN:
  9781119387152
• Edition: 1
• eBook ISBN:
  9781119387169
• Topic: Technology & Engineering
• Subtopic: Food Science
• Index: Technology & Engineering

A new study of the challenges presented by manufacturing bakery products in a health-conscious world

The impact of bakery products upon human nutrition is an increasingly pressing concern among consumers and manufacturers alike. With obesity and other diet-related conditions on the rise, the levels of salt, fat, and sugar found in many baked goods can no longer be overlooked. Those working in the baking industry are consequently turning more and more to science and technology to provide routes toward healthier alternatives to classic cake, bread, and pastry recipes.        

With Baking Technology and Nutrition, renowned food scientist Stanley P. Cauvain and co-author Rosie H. Clark present an innovative and much-needed study of the changes taking place in the world of baking. Their discussion focuses on the new avenues open to bakers looking to improve the nutritional value of their products and encompasses all related issues, from consumer preferences to the effects of nutritional enhancement upon shelf-life. Featuring an abundance of new research and insights into the possible future of modern baking, this unique text:

• Offers practical guidance on developing, delivering, and promoting high-nutrition bakery products
• Discusses reducing ingredients such as salt, fat, and sugar for improved nutrition while preserving quality and consumer acceptability
• Explores how wheat-based products can be ideal vehicles for improving the nutrition of major sectors of populations
• Suggests real-world solutions to problems rising from poorly defined quality guidelines and inadequate dialogue between bakers and nutritionists

Baking Technology and Nutrition is an indispensable and timely resourcefor technologists, manufacturers, healthcare practitioners, or anyone else working in today's food and nutrition industries. 

1
An Introduction to the History of the Manufacture of Bakery Products and Relevant Studies in Human Nutrition

1.1 The Historical Development of Bakery Products

Bakery products as we know them today, have a wide range of forms and commonly, the most important ingredient in the recipe is wheat flour. It is probably about 20 000 years ago that humankind discovered the nutritional qualities of the wild grass progenitors of modern wheats in the Middle East (Ucko and Dimbleby 1969). Recent research has shown that the processing of grains, the manufacture of dough and baking of bread, extends back to around 15 000 years ago (Arranz‐Otaegui et al. 2018) pre‐dating the arrival of ‘agriculture’ by some 4000 years. Thus, it appears that so‐called ‘hunter‐gatherer’ peoples, were the first to turn grains into a palatable and easily transported (convenience) food. Early breads were almost certainly similar to the flatbreads which are still available in the Middle East and many other parts of the world, today. This basic form of (unleavened) bread became the first processed and convenience food. No doubt it was not long before these early bakers discovered that the addition of salt improved the flavour profile of the mixture. Leaving the uncooked mixture exposed to the atmosphere would make it susceptible to contamination with wild yeasts and it would not be long before people began to appreciate the improvement in digestibility that would come from a spontaneously fermented mixture, and the light and aerated bread that came with it; a process still practised today and commonly referred to as ‘sour dough’ or artisan breads (Figure 1.1).

Figure 1.1 Sour dough and artisan breads.

From these early beginnings, producers of bread began to establish the principles which still underpin breadmaking today; mainly the manipulation and control of fermentation which delivers the carbon dioxide gas allowing the dough to rise and yield a light, aerated structure in the final product. Gradually from the early stages of domestic production, the baking of bread and other grain based products, moved to becoming a specialised craft and in civilisations like those of ancient Egypt, it developed into an industrialised form (Ashton 1904). The techniques recorded by the Egyptians in the paintings adorning the walls of a number of tombs, include the kneading of the dough in large tubs and the oven baking of the mixture in a mould are – the origins of the modern pan bread production. At this time, sifted wheat flour would have been chosen by the rich, while lower classes and workers would have had to make do with much coarser bread, often based on a mixture of wheat and barley (Bailey 1975).

Bread quickly became established as a staple food, classically referred to as ‘the staff of life’, because of the plentiful supply of wheat and other grains. Very soon those skilled in the art of baking began to add other ingredients to improve flavour and nutrition, and introduce new forms and shapes. Even in ancient times, fat was added to the dough to improve the softness and mouthfeel of the baked product, and honey to provide sweetness, yielding products which are referred to in ancient texts as ‘cakes’. Such products were often associated with festivals and baked in moulds of various forms, often to represent animals, and in ancient Greece occasionally more erotic forms (Toussaint‐Samat 1992).

By Roman times, baking had become a skilled art and a wide variety of products were available. At this time, the milling of wheat still mostly consisted of producing a coarse wholemeal flour. Following traditions established in ancient Egypt, this coarse wholemeal flour was sieved to remove a proportion of the bran, with the remaining flour being used for products to feed the elite classes. At the highest levels in Roman society the flour used would be comparable to the white flours of today, although with a little more bran than we are used to. These white flours were particularly favoured in the production of sweetened forms of breads and included confections based on ‘flaky’ pastry sheets, with cheese and honey figuring in the recipes. Even in Roman times, the position of bread in society was more than just providing sustenance, as exemplified from the quote from a satirical poet, Juvenal, in the late first century CE about satisfying the common people with bread and circuses; given the violent nature of the latter, this represents a curious juxtaposition of sensory pleasures. The ever‐increasing need of the Roman Empire to provide its population with basic foods, was a key driver behind the conquest of the grain rich growing regions of France (known then as Gaul) and Britain. This was to introduce the Romans to very different forms of wheat, in particular spelt, the flour from which was used to make a very round and soft off‐white loaf in the Gaulish regions. Today there has been a resurgence of interest in ancient grains in relationship to their potential contribution to ‘healthy’ eating, as will be discussed below.

Bakery products have a long association with symbolism and rituals and this resulted in the development of products that we would still recognise today, many of which are still associated with the festivals of many religions. In the northern hemisphere, there has been a long tradition of making special breads to celebrate successful harvest of wheat, for example the traditional wheatsheaf and representations of the Cornucopia (horn of plenty); the latter stretching back several thousand years. Not all traditional products are associated with religions, for example the croissant is believed to have been invented by the bakers of Vienna to celebrate their timely warning against the attack by the Ottoman Turks in the fifteenth century. There can be more mundane reasons for creating special products or marking the surface of bread with symbols. For example, bread produced for the Roman legions was stamped with the relevant legion number to ensure that the product reached the relevant customer. The origins of cutting the dough's surface to create a particular pattern, has the pragmatic function of differentiating your product from that of another baker; such practices still exist today but have often become enshrined in the desirable characteristics of the product, for example the London Bloomer illustrated in Figure 1.2.

Figure 1.2 London (UK) bloomer loaf.

As far back as the time of the Egyptian Pharos, baking had become a large‐scale state sponsored and organised industry in order to feed the large workforce necessary for construction of monuments like the pyramids (Samuel 1999). While the individual bakeries were small in size, the organisation of the production was based on creating central sites to deliver the mass of bread required. The Romans were to employ a similar approach to feeding their armies throughout their empire. Other examples of centralised or state organised bread production, include those associated with the sites of major castles and monasteries, some of which could have had resident populations equivalent to small medieval towns, and certainly larger than villages. In medieval towns there would be many bakeries but of a less organised nature, however, the continuing rise in bread production in the medieval period was to lead to the voluntary organisation of baking in the form of guilds and other similar organisations. In part this was a response to regulatory pressures from local and regional authorities to ensure that consumers would be getting the required quality of product, at appropriate prices. Crucially in medieval periods, significant measures were undertaken to control the weight of bread at the point of sale (Bailey 1975) and in many cases the price was set by governments. In the modern era, legislative control of bread price is less common, though control of bread weights is universally applied and there may be a maximum limit to product moisture or minimum solids control to ensure that consumers get what they pay for.

Alongside bread, other forms of bakery products were evolving, so that by 1440 there are references to pastry cooks, and the baking of cakes and biscuits. There were pies in both savoury and sweet forms using flaky and filo‐style pastries. Around the same time, there are references to fritters, wafers, waffles, and tarts. The growing appetite of the western world for sugar, known from ancient Roman and Greek times through the access to the ‘Sakcharon’ (sweet reed) and based on raw materials from the Indian sub‐continent, was accelerated by the voyages of discovery to the Caribbean, and it became a key ingredient of many baked products and other confections. The high price of sugar at this time would have restricted its consumption to the higher social orders, with those of lower class having a diet in which bread still played a critical role. The inability of some states to provide sufficient bread could have serious consequences, even leading to rioting. An illustration of how important bakery products had become by the seventeenth century is the (in)famous quote from Marie Antoinette who, on being told that French peasants were rioting because they had no bread, is supposed to have said, ‘Let them eat cake’ (the traditional translation of the French phrase ‘Qu'ils mangent de la brioche’). Though this attribution is unproven, it has become a long‐standing illustration of the importance of bread in society and of the divide between the elite and the common populous. If the French peasantry lacked bread, they were most unlikely to have access to sweetened bakery products.

Gradually, the artisanal base of baking was to give way to increasing industrialisation as the Industrial Revolution gathered pace in eighteenth century Europe. With increasing access to reliable sources of power, mills and bakeries were able to grow in size and provide large‐scale production of bread for the industrial workers of the developing cities. At the same time, the knowledge of the world around us was expand...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Table of Contents
• Preface
• 1 An Introduction to the History of the Manufacture of Bakery Products and Relevant Studies in Human Nutrition
• 2 Summary of the Manufacture of Bakery Products and Their Key Characteristics
• 3 Delivering Health Benefits via Bakery Products
• 4 Drivers for Improved Health and Nutrition via Bakery Products
• 5 Barriers to the Acceptance of Bakery Products with Improved Nutrition
• 6 The Opportunities for Developing Improved Nutrition via Bakery Products
• 7 Approaches to Development of Nutritionally Enhanced Bakery Products
• 8 Communicating Relevant Messages
• Glossary
• Index
• End User License Agreement