Characteristics Of Gellan Gum Based Food Gels.

Fruit-based gels with gellan gum as the gelling agent was prepared.
Textural attributes of the gellan gum gels, formed with different concentrations
of the gum (0.5–3.0%) and sugar and/or pineapple juice, were determined
employing the methods of large-deformation uniaxial compression
and stress relaxation. Fracture stress/energy markedly increases with an
increase in the concentration of gellan gum while fracture strain exhibits a
marginal effect. The change in these compressive textural parameters is
more pronounced for sugar added samples compared with gels without
sugar. Marked decay in stress relaxation curves was observed; the extent of
relaxation decreases marginally with an increase in gum content up to 2%
but shows much lesser values beyond 2% addition. The sugar added samples
exhibit lesser relaxation characteristics but higher relaxation times indicating
elastic characteristics compared with samples without sugar. Use of
gellan gum provides an innovative method for developing fruit juice based
gels as a convenience food because of attractive transparent appearance
and textural attributes.