Canola protein isolate functionality II

#The present invention relates to a canola protein isolate and its functionality in a wide range of applications.

#In U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,844,086 and 6,005,076 (“Murray II”), assigned to the assignee hereof and tile disclosures of which are incorporated herein by reference, there is described a process for the isolation of protein isolates from oil seed meal having a significant fat content, including canola oil seed meal having such content. The steps involved in this process include solubilizing proteinaceous material from oil seed meal, which also solubilizes fat in the meal and removing fat from the resulting aqueous protein solution. The aqueous protein solution may be separated from the residual oil seed meal before or after the fat removal step. The defatted protein solution then is concentrated to increase the protein concentration while maintaining the ionic strength substantially constant, after which the concentrated protein solution may be subjected to a further fat removal step. The concentrated protein solution then is diluted to cause the formation of a cloud-like mass of highly aggregated protein molecules as discrete protein droplets in micellar form. The protein micelles are allowed to settle to form an aggregated, coalesced, dense amorphous, sticky gluten-like protein isolate mass termed “protein micellar mass” or PMM, which is separated from residual aqueous phase and dried.

#The protein isolate has a protein content (as determined by Kjeldahl N×6.25) of at least about 90 wt %, is substantially undenatured (as determined by differential scanning calorimetry) and has a low residual fat content of less than about 1 wt %. The yield of protein isolate obtained using this procedure, in terms of the proportion of protein extracted from the oil seed meal which is recovered as dried protein isolate was generally less than 40 wt %, typically around 20 wt %.

#The invention is illustrated by the following Examples:

#This Example illustrates preparation of the canola protein isolate samples for testing functionality of the protein.

#‘a’ kg of commercial canola meal was added to ‘b’ L of 0.15 M NaCl solution at ambient temperature, agitated ‘c’ minutes to provide an aqueous protein solution having a protein content of ‘d’ g/L. The residual canola meal was removed and washed on a vacuum filter belt. The resulting protein solution was clarified by centrifugation to produce a clarified protein solution having a protein content of ‘e’ g/L following by the addition of 1 wt % Powdered Activated Carbon (PAC).