Glutograph 'E': A Simple Rheometer to Measure Quality of Cooked Pasta

Abstract

Glutograph ‘E’ was designed to determine the stretch and relaxation properties of wet gluten. Usage of this equipment to evaluate the cooked pasta texture has not been reported and thus is the goal of this research. Procedure development involved the evaluation of the number of impulses, relaxation time, the number of spaghetti strands, and the number of tests per sample to give a reliable treatment mean. Different impulses settings affected the magnitude of strain, time and percent recovery. Traditional spaghetti required less time to reach 800 B.U and had greater percent recovery and strain values than did nontraditional spaghetti. Glutograph results were compared with firmness results obtained using a texture analyzer (TA-XT2) with a pasta blade or with a Modified Ottawa Cell. Compression type probe parameters were positively correlated to glutograph stretch time. Glutograph E can be used as potential equipment to detect differences in texture of cooked pasta.