Application of Xanthan Gum in Food

As a food additive, xanthan gum has become an important stabilizer, suspending agent, emulsifier, thickener, and adhesive in the fields of beverages, cakes, jelly, canned food, seafood and meat products processing, etc.

1) Food thickening stabilizer with acid and salt resistance

Xanthan gum is used in various foods such as fruit juice drinks, concentrated fruit juices, and seasonings (such as soy sauce, oyster sauce, salad dressing).
The stabilizing effect of xanthan gum is obviously better than other gums, and it has strong thermal stability. The general high temperature sterilization will not affect it. It can be used in various fruit juice drinks, pulp drinks, vegetable protein drinks, etc., the dosage is 0.08～0.3 .
Xanthan gum's excellent salt resistance, acid and alkali resistance can completely replace the traditional thickener starch in soy sauce. It can overcome the shortcomings of starch precipitation, and can make the soy sauce fine and uniform, improve wall-hanging and coloring properties, and extend shelf life .
For flavored sauces such as jam and bean sauce, xanthan gum is used as a thickening stabilizer to make the sauce uniform, good mixing, non-caking, easy to fill, and improve the taste.

2) Food emulsifier

Used as an emulsifier in various protein beverages and milk beverages to prevent oily water layer and improve protein stability, prevent protein precipitation, and also use its emulsifying ability as a foaming agent and foam stabilizer, such as beer manufacturing, etc. .
After adding 0.02% xanthan gum to the emulsification system based on legume protein, the emulsification is obviously improved, and the mixed system has high shear rate and heat-induced high viscosity characteristics.

3) Food filler

As a stable high-viscosity filler, it can be widely used in the processing of various types of snacks, bread, biscuits, candies and other foods. Without changing the traditional flavor of the food, the food has better shape retention and longer The shelf life and better taste are conducive to the diversification and industrial scale production of these foods.
In the production of various frozen foods, xanthan gum has the functions of preventing its loss of water, delaying aging, and extending the shelf life.

4) Food emulsion stabilizer

Used as an emulsion stabilizer in frozen foods. Xanthan gum in ice cream and ice cream can adjust the viscosity of the mixture to make it have a uniform and stable composition and a smooth and soft texture.
Because the relationship between the viscosity of xanthan gum and the temperature has plasticity and shearing properties, the viscosity decreases and the resistance decreases during the processing operation, which is beneficial to the process. In the cooling aging stage, the viscosity recovers, which is beneficial to increase the expansion rate and prevent The formation of large ice crystals in the ice cream tissue makes the ice cream smooth and delicate.
At the same time, the freeze-thaw stability of the product is improved, and the cream and water are evenly mixed during melting, and no slurry separation phenomenon occurs. The general aging time is 2～3h. The dosage is 0.2% to 0.4%.

5) Food adhesive

Xanthan gum can cross-link some water-soluble powder substances, such as sodium alginate, casein, methyl cellulose and polyethylene glycol cellulose sodium salt, to make a binder.
This adhesive is used in food processing to improve texture and increase film-forming properties.
This property of xanthan gum can be used to make granular pastes. Compared with traditional pastes, pastes made of xanthan gum have low dispersibility, high uniformity and solubility, good fluidity and filling performance, and excellent solid storage properties due to non-cohesiveness.

The aqueous solution of xanthan gum has unique rheological properties—shear thinning. As the shear rate increases, the apparent viscosity of the solution decreases significantly; it has thickening properties and has a greater viscosity at lower concentrations; it has good Water solubility, stability to heat, acid and alkali, and good compatibility with a variety of salts.
These many characteristics enable it to significantly improve the texture, taste and appearance quality of food by controlling the rheological behavior of the product, and increase its commercial value. Therefore, the application prospect in food is very broad.