Yeast extract is a natural flavouring ingredient, which is the product of yeast after plasmic wall separation and complete autolysis using its own hydrolytic enzyme system to remove the cell wall and insoluble molecules, and has been widely used in the current domestic food industry [1].
As a golden ingredient for salt reduction and freshness enhancement, it is a kind of natural flavouring auxiliary with nutrition, safety and health care, which plays an important role in improving food flavour, food quality and nutritional value, etc. It is widely used as one of the four major flavouring products together with monosodium glutamate, hydrolysed proteins and flavour-presenting nucleotides.
In addition to applications in the field of flavourings, yeast extracts have also been used in meat products and baked goods, and are gradually expanding to puffed foods, aquatic products and nutritional supplements.
What is the application of yeast extract in seasoning?
Some studies show that in recent years, per capita salt intake in China has been much higher than the World Health Organisation’s recommended intake of two to three times. High sodium salt diet is a key factor that endangers human health. Low-salt diet has become a new trend in healthy eating. ‘Salt reduction without reducing flavour’ has become a hotspot of seasoning formulation technology.
Currently, food seasonings are developing in the direction of low sodium, and potassium chloride can be used to partially replace sodium chloride. Potassium chloride has an unacceptable bitter and metallic taste, so it is necessary to add a flavouring agent or masking agent to hide the bitter taste. Another way is to add flavour enhancers to supplement the substances that enhance the original flavour of the food, which are commonly used to regulate the freshness of the food in order to improve the organoleptic quality of the food, and mainly include amino acids, nucleotides and yeast extracts [3].
A large number of amino acids and nucleotides contained in yeast extracts have significant freshness effects, which can coordinate and balance the flavour, enhance the flavour, mask off-flavours, and even generate more freshness. A large number of flavour-presenting peptides contained in yeast extracts can amplify the acceptance function of the fresh taste receptors in human taste, enhance the sodium ion sensing effect, and present a significant freshness-enhancing and sodium-reducing effect. Yeast extract products have been used by many flavouring companies in the world as a very effective fresh flavour substitute for salt reduction [2].
What is the application of yeast extract in soy sauce?
There are two main ways to apply yeast extract in soy sauce, one is to add soy sauce-specific yeast extract together with other auxiliary materials such as salt and sugar colour in the blending process, and the other is to add yeast extract in the original soy sauce fermentation to participate in the fermentation.
Soy sauce-specific yeast extract has the characteristics of good flavour integration, good solubility, etc. It has a fresh and mellow taste, strong taste coordination and is very convenient to use. Yeast extract can: 1) mask the various bad odours produced by the instability of soy sauce processing and highlight the natural fermentation aroma of the product; 2) coordinate and balance the flavour of various raw and auxiliary materials, moderate the sense of straightness, enhance the sense of mellowness, and make the product taste more natural and softer; 3) make up for the shortcomings of the product’s physicochemical indexes, and improve the product’s colouring effect.
What is the application of yeast extract in chicken essence?
The use of yeast extract is also very common in the chicken essence industry, and most chicken essence manufacturers have become accustomed to using yeast extract to enrich the flavour and harmonise the texture of their products. Some studies have found that the addition of yeast extract to chicken essence can significantly improve the indicators of amino nitrogen, total nitrogen and flavour-presenting nucleotides in the product [2]. It can also effectively maintain the retention time of the aroma of chicken essence, which has a significant effect on the overall taste of the product [3].
Yeast extract has been added to products such as Donggu Yipinxian Chicken Extract, Knorr Chicken Extract and Matsutake Fresh Seasoning, and the descriptions tend to be ‘fresh, natural and rich’.
What is the application of yeast extract in hotpot base?
Some studies have found that the ability of yeast extract to improve hotpot base is fundamentally brought about by the flavour-presenting substances contained in the yeast extract itself, which is rich in amino acids and peptides that can enhance a wide range of basic flavours such as freshness and meatiness, and peptides that can remove undesirable flavours such as bitterness and astringency [1].
What is the application of yeast extract in chilli powder?
Seasoned chilli powder is prepared from fresh red chilli as raw material, after drying, crushing, and then adding sodium chloride, glutamic acid and other flavouring agents, which is loved by consumers and is an essential condiment on people’s table. Controlling the salt content of seasoned chilli powder raw materials and products is of great significance to the dietary health of people in spicy eating areas. It has been found that when chilli powder is used as raw material, low-sodium mixed salt, which is a salt substitute, is compounded with yeast extract, a flavour enhancer, the yeast extract can also increase the freshness of the chilli powder, and under the premise of guaranteeing freshness, it can improve the overall taste of the product, reduce the content of monosodium glutamate (MSG), and at the same time reduce the amount of sodium used in the chilli powder. The optimised flavoured chilli powder has a harmonious taste and high acceptability, and achieves the goal of ‘reducing salt and sodium’ without affecting the flavour of the flavoured chilli powder [4].
Application in meat products
With the further development of the meat industry, in order to reduce production costs, there is an urgent need for a meat protein substitute with high protein content, rich nutrition, hygiene and safety, and low price. The protein content of yeast extract is 10.6%, the free amino acid nitrogen content is 4.2%, and the compound nucleotide content is 3.9%. The application in meat processing can make the products pure in colour, rich in aroma and full in taste. As a meat protein substitute in the production of western-style meat products (western-style ham), yeast extract can significantly reduce the cost of raw materials, improve the texture and increase the yield. At the same time, yeast extracts can also improve the nutritional composition of Western ham and increase the mineral and vitamin content due to the richness of nucleotides in yeast extracts [2], such as Shuanghui’s authentic meat sausage to which yeast extracts have been added.
Applications in baked goods
In the production process of baked goods, the addition of an appropriate amount of yeast extract can improve all aspects of product quality. On the one hand, yeast extract interacts with the gluten matrix in the dough to increase the dough’s extensibility and baking characteristics, giving the food product a more prominent structure and texture. On the other hand, the alginate contained in yeast extracts not only has an excellent effect on preventing starch aging, but also has an inhibitory effect on lipolysis in the fat component, which plays a good role in maintaining the quality of food products [2].
Yeast extract has been used in soda crackers in a number of application cases, such as Totaste, Pacific (with the addition of yeast complex flavouring).
Applications in aquatic product development
It has also been found that certain concentration of yeast extract dipping solution formulations have been found to have an improvement in fish quality. This preliminary exploration provides better theoretical support for the development and quality control of seasoned seabass, and the yeast extract for seasoned aquatic products is a novel research in China’s food industry, which can be combined with the actual production and market demand in the future, to develop seasoned seabass products that are tasty, nutritious and convenient [5].
What is the difference between yeast extract and yeast?
The term ‘yeast’ is becoming more and more recognisable as people learn more about the food processing world. So how do you distinguish yeast extract from yeast?
Simply put, yeast extract is a post-processed product of yeast, which means that yeast is generally a granular product, while yeast extract is often a liquid or paste type of product; fresh yeast is not nutritious, while yeast extract is a nutritious food ingredient; yeast is a single-celled organism, while yeast extract is an inactivated and further processed product.
Difference one:
In the approximate number of cases, yeast extract can be used as a food ingredient, is on the food seasoning, refreshing has a very good effect, which is much better than in the ingredients of a single addition of monosodium glutamate (MSG), chicken essence. Because the yeast extract is rich in glutamic acid obtained from fermentation of organic acids and peptide compounds that are beneficial to the human body. These acids are usually found in baked pasta products.
Yeast, on the other hand, is usually used for the fermentation of food products for use, such as wine spice, yeast powder for fermenting bread, and so on. Yeast is mostly used in the fermentation of food products, and many people mistakenly believe that yeast is a food additive, but yeast is recognised globally as a food product, and it is not a food additive.
Difference two:
Yeast extracts are better than yeast in terms of flavour taste. For example, yeast extract has a strong characteristic flavour and salty taste. Although most yeast extracts are used in seafood and pickled foods, there are still many sweet foods in which yeast extracts are used. As a nutraceutical, yeast extract can be mixed with bread and butter or mixed in hot drinks to produce a unique flavour. Yeast extract is a very popular food ingredient especially in the UK, New Zealand and Australian regions.
Difference Three:
Looking at yeast alone, it is yet not a nutritious food ingredient, whereas yeast extract is very nutritious. Yeast consumes a lot of nutrients during the fermentation process, which would have provided the body with plenty of energy. It can be said that yeast extract is inactivated yeast so that sufficient nutrients can be retained.
Yeast is actually a living organism. It is a single-celled fungus that is capable of converting sugar and starch into carbon dioxide and alcohol. Because of this function, speciality yeasts have been developed for use in white wine, bread and beer production, among others.
In general, yeast extract and yeast have a very obvious difference, although both are used in the field of food processing, but the role of its efficacy is different, the resulting food taste and flavour is very different.