Production of Functional Chicken Sausage by Quinoa Flour and Studying of Physicochemical and Textural Properties

Introduction: Today, Excessive consumption of fatty foods, especially high-fat meat products, has increased obesity, hypercholesterolemia, cardiovascular disease or cancer (Fernandez-Diez et al., 2015). Quinoa belongs to the Chenopodiaceae family, the genus Chenopodium, a high-nutritional starchy seed that contains nutrients and can be used in the production of meat products (Fernandez Diaz et al. 2015). Quinoa's antioxidant activity is associated with vitamin E content and phenolic compounds. Tocopherols (vitamin E) are fat-soluble antioxidants found in the chloroplast membrane. They interact with unsaturated acyl lipid groups and stabilize the membrane and release different types of reactive oxygen (Sadler 2004). Despite proving the nutritional effects of quinoa, its effect on promoting the nutritional value of various products, including meat products, has not been investigated. Due to the disadvantages of the fat used in meat products and the antioxidant effects of quinoa seeds, in this study, quinoa flour was used as an alternative to part of the oil in sausage formulations and the physicochemical properties of the produced sausages were investigated.
Material and methods: 15 sausage samples containing different amounts of flour (4-0%), oil (5-15.3%) and quinoa (10-0%) were produced. Formulations include chicken (55%) and other ingredients including ice powder (15.87%), fresh garlic (1%), salt (0.9%), sugar (0.7%), polyphosphate (0.3%) was carrageenan utah (1%), whey powder (2%), starch (3%), nitrite (0.1%), ascorbic acid (1.25%) and spices (1%). The meat was minced with garlic in a meat grinder and then ground in an electric mills with salt and polyphosphate for 2 minutes. The meat dough was then mixed in a food processor with carrageenan, sugar, water powder, starch, flour and quinoa for a few minutes. Then ice and half the oil were added and mixed again. After the dough was homogeneous, when the ingredients became sticky, the other half of the oil and spice mixture were added. Finally, the mixture was filled with filler in the coating and cooked by Ben Marie method for 80 minutes at 80 °C. At the end, the cooked sausages were placed under cold water for a few minutes to heat shock and then stored in the refrigerator at 4°C until the experiments were performed. Then physicochemical properties (moisture retention, fat absorption, cooking loss, antioxidant capacity, and ash content), color, texture hardness and sensory evaluation during 30 days storage at 4°C were studied. To evaluate and modeling the influence of the factors studied on the qualitative and quantitative indices, the RSM response method was used to Behnken-Box design.
Results and discussion: Measuring ash showed that percentage of ash increased with increasing quinoa content. Quinoa as an pseudocereal, a good source of minerals, such as calcium, magnesium, iron, zinc, phosphorus, fiber and vitamin B, more than just cereals. It is also a good source of vitamin E, thiamine, folic acid and vitamin C (Valencia Chamorro 2003). The reason that quinoa increases the amount of ash in sausages compared to flour is due to the increase in these minerals and vitamins in its structure. The results of measuring the moisture content showed that if the quinoa increased, the moisture increased. Moisture also increases with Increase the amount of flour (p˂0.05). In a study of pasta containing quinoa flour, the retention of moisture in pasta containing quinoa flour was higher than that made from wheat flour, which is due to the presence of various hydrophilic compounds such as polysaccharides and proteins in quinoa (Lorusso et al. 2017). In another study on the replacement of fat with quinoa in dry sausages, it was reported that the average moisture content in the control sausages was lower than the samples containing quinoa as a fat replacer (Fernandez Diaz et al. 2015). The results also show that the interaction between oil, quinoa and time is significant. In the study of the effect of quinoa flour on burgers, the highest fat content for burgers prepared with 7% and 10% of quinoa flour was determined. The effect of adding quinoa on fat content may be related to the storage of oil in quinoa flour, which leads to more storage of oil in meat products during the cooking process (Ho and Yu 2015; Taloker 2015; Liu et al. 2015). On the other hand, in low quinoa values, by increasing flour content, the increase in acidity is high. A study of frankfurter sausage samples made with tilapia fillets containing 20 grams of quinoa flour, showed that these sausages had a significantly higher pH compared to control sausages with a pH of 5.6, resulting in acidity in these sausages decreased (Zapata et al. 2016). In addition, quinoa prevents cooking loss. A study of quinoa-rich bread found that the lowest bread crumbs were found to be related to those with the highest amount of quinoa flour and the lowest wasted to those with the least amount of quinoa flour, which could be due to more water absorption during preparation. The dough has a high water holding capacity in hydrochloride and reduces water evaporation during cooking or, in other words, increases the final moisture in the samples containing quinoa (Pour Mohammadi et al., 2009). In this study, DPPH was used to investigate the antioxidant capacity of quinoa flour during sausage storage. Statistically, among the factors influencing the antioxidant activity of sausages, quinoa flour was significant at a probability level of P Conclusion: The results of this study showed that quinoa flour increased the antioxidant capacity in the produced samples and due to the presence of various hydrophilic compounds such as polysaccharides and protein in quinoa flour, the moisture content of sausages increased. Quinoa flour also reduced the amount of lightness (L*), increased the amount of redness (a*), and also increased the amount of yellowness (b*) due to its carotenoid compounds. On the other hand, due to the presence of unsaturated fatty acids and phospholipids in quinoa flour, the fat of sausages increased. But quinoa did not have a significant effect on the hardness of sausages.