Carotenoids evolution during pasta, bread and water biscuit preparation from wheat flours

The loss of carotenoids content during food processing was investigated during the production of bread, water biscuits and pasta from refined flours of einkorn, bread and, for pasta only, durum wheat semolina. Total carotenoids content decreased throughout the processing stages. For bread and water biscuits, kneading led to limited degradation (on average, 15 and 12%, respectively), bread leavening had almost negligible effects (3%), while baking had a marked influence on carotenoids loss in bread crust and water biscuits (29 and 19%, respectively) but not in bread crumb (3%). In contrast, in pasta the longer kneading-extrusion phase determined relevant losses (48%), while the drying step did not induce significant changes. During kneading, T. monococcum consistently showed lesser percentage degradation, probably because of the lower lipoxygenase activity of its flour. Overall, manufacturing led to average carotenoid losses of 21, 47, 31 and 49% for bread crumb, bread crust, water biscuits and pasta, respectively. Notwithstanding the significant decrease, einkorn still supplied considerably more carotenoids than durum and bread wheats in the end products, characterised by an attractive deep yellow colour.