Influence of partial substitution of wheat flour with sprouted oat flours on physicochemical and textural characteristics of wheat bread

There is an issue to be solved in wheat bread processing that the substitution of oat flour enhanced the nutritional value, but deteriorated the texture of wheat bread. To improve the textural attributes of the bread, the inclusion of sprouted oat flour for up to 120 h was investigated in this study. Results indicated that oat beta-glucan (OBG) of the bread decreased from 7.86 to 1.88 g/100 g, while total phenols and gamma-aminobutyric increased nearly threefold after sprouting for 120 h. The dough stability and rheological properties of wheat with sprouted oat flour were determined to aid the prediction of the textural properties of the final bread products. There was a positive relationship between stability time and viscoelasticity of mixed dough and textural parameters of wheat bread with sprouting oat flour. Compared with wheat bread with unsprouted oat flour, wheat bread with sprouted oat flour was characterized by lower hardness, chewiness, and gumminess, higher cohesiveness, springiness, and resilience. Additionally, the confocal laser scanning microscope illustrated that unsprouted oat flour destroyed the continuity of gluten protein network. Surprisingly, dough with oat flour sprouting for 72 h presented an orderly and dense network structure resulting from the OBG integration. This study suggests that it is promising to develop multigrain bread with more various nutrition and more satisfying textural attributes by an appropriate sprouting process.

Automated summary

This study investigated the effects of sprouted oat flour on the texture of wheat bread. Results showed that the inclusion of sprouted oat flour decreased oat beta-glucan content and increased total phenols and gamma-aminobutyric acid. The rheological properties of the dough were determined to predict the textural attributes of the final bread products. Wheat bread with sprouted oat flour exhibited improved texture compared to wheat bread with unsprouted oat flour, including lower hardness, chewiness, and gumminess, and higher cohesiveness, springiness, and resilience. Confocal laser scanning microscope observations showed that unsprouted oat flour disrupted the continuity of the gluten protein network, while sprouted oat flour formed an orderly and dense network structure.