Development and structural characterization of peach palm heart-based plant meat analogues enriched with supplementary plant protein

Abstract

Importance of the work: Peach palm heart is an underutilized perennial crop with potential as a structural ingredient for plant-based meat analogues. Objectives: To develop peach palm heart-based meat analogues and evaluate the processing effects on nutritional, physicochemical and structural properties. Materials and Methods: Peach palm heart minced- and burger-type prototypes with 5% pineapple core juice were processed by microwave (800 W, 5 min) or retort (121°C, 10 min). Nutritional composition, amino acids, color, cooking loss, water absorption capacity, texture profile analysis and Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy- principal component analysis (FTIR-PCA) were evaluated against chicken breast and commercial plant-based meat. Results: The selected prototypes were cholesterol-free, low in saturated fat and provided 10.02–11.92 g protein/100 g product. In the high-protein formulation, crude protein reached 29.62 g/100 g after microwave cooking. The retort minced-type prototype had the greatest storage color stability over 180 d (total color difference = 1.84), whereas the microwave burger-type prototype had the highest mean ± SD values for hardness (7,378.39 ± 435.20 g) and chewiness (11,610.38 ± 997.08). The FTIR-PCA analysis suggested that processing-dependent structural variation was associated with protein-fiber structural variation. Main finding: Peach palm heart showed potential as a structurally functional perennial ingredient for nutritionally complementary plant-based meat analogues under different thermal processing conditions.