Functional whole wheat breads: Compelling internal architecture

In this study, X-ray micro-computed tomography scanning coupled with image analysis was used to investigate the influence of bread formulation on micro-structural characteristics of bread particularly its crumb. Results for standard whole wheat flour bread (WWB) and two functional breads formulated by partial replacement of whole wheat flour by 10% (FGF10) and 20% (FGF20) cryo-ground fermented green gram flour showed a significant variation in their micro-structural properties. For example, the total volume of bread crumb and total surface area of pores were nearly reduced by 34% in FGF10 and 71% in FGF20 samples compared to WWB. Further, height of loaf along with crumb properties: porosity, total number of pores, interconnectivity index, diameter of open pore, and volume of open pore followed the order WWB > FGF10 > FGF20. These variations have resulted in 11.85-16.75% reduction in specific loaf volume of functional breads compared to WWB. Conversely, crumb properties such as wall thickness, volume fraction of solid phase, percentage of closed pore, diameter of closed pore, and volume of closed pore showed reverse trend resulting in rise in crumb hardness of functional breads by 22.57-37.21% compared to WWB. Three-dimensional images of breads also supported the quantitative results.