Tomato-derived thickening agent
AssigneeConopco, Inc.
InventorsSander Dubbleman, Nikolaos Mavroudis, Leandro Oliehoek
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Abstract
The present invention provides a tomato-derived thickening agent, said agent being characterized in that, on a dry weight basis, it contains: 0.1-3 wt. % of lycopene; 14-34 wt. % of protein; 11-35 wt. % of pectin; 17-39 wt. % of sugars selected from fructose, glucose, and combinations thereof. The invention further relates to a process for preparing a tomato-derived thickening agent and to the use of such a thickening agent in food products such as tomato ketchup, tomato-based sauces, pizza sauce, tomato soup and tomato juice.
Claims9
A process for preparing a tomato-derived thickening agent comprising the steps of:
- a. providing a tomato pulp containing 3-15 wt. % tomato soluble solids (TSS) and 0.3-5 wt. % tomato insoluble solids (TIS);
- b. isolating from said tomato pulp a tomato serum fraction having a reduced TIS content of less than 2.0 wt. % and a TSS content of at least 3 wt. %;
- c. subjecting said tomato serum fraction to a filtration step to produce a retentate and a filtrate, said filtration step employing a membrane with a molecular weight cut-off (MWCO) in the range of 10-20,000 kDa;
- d. collecting the retentate;
- and
- e. drying the retentate to obtain the tomato-derived thickening agent.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.