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Introduction to Food Chemistry

What is Food Science?

Food Science is the discipline in which biology, physical sciences, and engineering are used to study the nature of foods, the causes of their deterioration, and the principles underlying food processing. (IFT)

Main Points:

Carbohydrates (C:H:O of 1:2:1)

• Sugars
• Sweet to taste
• 4 Kcal/gram
• terms to know: monosaccharide, disaccharide, reducing/non-reducing sugar, hydrolysis
• sugars to be familiar with: sucrose, fructose, lactose, mannose, glucose, galactose

Disaccharide	Description	Component monosaccharides
sucrose	common table sugar	glucose + fructose
lactose	main sugar in milk	galactose + glucose
maltose	product of starch hydroloysis	glucose + glucose

An introduction to food carbohydrates can be found here.
More detailed information on carbohydrate structure can be found here
General Reactions of carbohydrates can be found here
More details on non-enzymatic browning is here
Strecker degredations are explained here
Carbohydrates as sweeteners are discussed here

Starches

• Polysaccharides: amylose and amylopectin
• 4 Kcal/gram
• terms to know: polysaccharide, cellulose, amylase, maltase, glycogen, amylose, amylopectin
• Cellulose can not be digested by humans (b/c f bonds)

Information on starches can be found here
Gums and stabilzers are discussed here

Lipids (Fats) CH₂COOR-CHCOOR'-CH₂-COOR’’

• 9 Kcal/gram
• know how fats are formed
• melting pint differences, how are they changed (hydrogenation)
• Saturated: no double bonds
• Un-saturated: contains double bonds
• Composed f Fatty Acids
  • C 19:1 (19 refers to carbons in chain, 1 refers to number of double bonds)
• Terms to know: hydrogenation, saturated, unsaturated, fatty acids, glycerol, autoxidation, rancidity, triglycerides

A general description of lipids is available here
Lipid structure is detailed here
The mechanisms involved in lipid oxidation begin here
The reactions of free radicals is described here
The formation of singlet oxygen is discussed here
Antioxidants are described here
Hydrogenation and trans fat formation is described here
Interesterification is detailed here
A description of lipid polymorphism is here

Proteins (contain NH)

• Made of Amino Acids
• 4 Kcal/gram
• Four different protein structure classes (primary->quaternary)
• Amino acids contain nitrogen
• Essential amino acids

A general discussion of food proteins is here

More information on amino acids can be found here

A discussion of protein structure can be found here

A description protein denaturation  is here

The functions of proteins in food are discussed here

Enzyme reactions in food are discussed here

Examples of Laboratories

* Water

o Determine the moisture content in a food (drying)

o Determine densities of water solutions (mass and volume)

* Carbohydrates (sugars and starches)

o Detection of sugars/starches with indicator solutions (iodine, benedict etc)

o Effect of different sugars (ex: yeast growth experiment)

o Differences in reducing and non-reducing sugars (hydrolyze non-reducing sugar into corresponding reducing sugars, Fehlings or Benedicts Solution)

o Differences in mono and poly-saccharides (hydrolysis)

* Lipids (Fats)

o Emulsion Stability (using different emulsifiers or additives)

o Hexane Extraction (for quantification)

o Melting Pint and Saturation Levels

* Proteins

o Isolation in alkaline solution

o Kjeldahl determination

o Enzyme Chemistry (basic)