High-protein plant-based cheese analogue

到2050年，世界人口预计将达到90亿，这意味着需要养活更多的人口。目前，动物蛋白质和动物副产品（如牛奶和奶酪）每单位蛋白质产生的温室气体排放量最大。此外，气候危机正在恶化，导致严重干旱，对农业和粮食安全造成不利后果。很明显，我们不能继续依赖动物产品来满足我们不断扩大的粮食需求。由于这些原因，沿着几个道德困境，已经转向以植物为基础的食品形式的更可持续的替代品。 最近，在牛奶和肉类类似物的推动下，对植物性食品的需求已经超过对动物性产品的需求数倍。然而，从营养和功能的角度来看，奶酪类似物明显落后，因为它们几乎不含蛋白质，并且不像乳制品那样伸展和融化。 在这里，我们建议开发一种高蛋白质的奶酪类似物产品的融化，拉伸和油的结合性能，类似于那些乳制品奶酪。 所采取的方法是基于我们的发现，即某些淀粉可以用作功能基质，其中不同的蛋白质可以作为“填料”以高质量分数添加，从而产生具有所需感官，物理和营养功能的特定颗粒填充的聚合物网络。 我们将描述许多植物蛋白质（豌豆，扁豆，蚕豆，羽扇豆，鹰嘴豆，豆类等）的物理特性，并将其与拉伸流变参数和热软化（“熔化”）相关联。 我们还将确定如何处理蛋白质改变其物理状态，从而功能。最终的目标是任何蛋白质都可以被操纵，作为奶酪类似物基质中的填充物。这将对工业非常有用，因为对一种或两种特定成分的依赖较少，从而可以优化营养，感官体验，功能和成本。 Daiya是北美素食奶酪类的第一品牌。这里开发的技术将确保持续的成功，并帮助他们成为该领域的全球领先品牌。

The world's population is expected to reach 9 billion by the year 2050, meaning more mouths to feed. Currently, animal proteins and animal by-products such as milk and cheese generate the greatest amounts of greenhouse gas emissions per unit mass of protein. Moreover, the climate crisis is worsening, resulting in severe droughts with adverse consequences for agriculture and food security. It is evident that we cannot continue to rely on animal-based products for our expanding food needs. For these reasons, along with several ethical quandaries, there has been a shift to more sustainable alternatives in the form of plant-based foods. Recently, the demand for plant-based foods has outpaced the demand for animal-based products several fold, driven by milk and meat analogues. Cheese analogues, however, lag significantly behind, both from nutritional and functional perspectives, since they contain little to no protein and do not stretch and melt as their dairy counterparts. Here we propose to develop a high-protein cheese analogue product with melting, stretching and oil binding properties that resemble those of dairy cheese. The approach taken is based on our discovery that certain starches can be used as a functional matrix where different proteins can be added as "fillers" at high mass fractions, creating specific particle-filled polymer networks with the desired sensory, physical, and nutritional functionality. We will characterize the physical properties of many plant proteins (pea, lentil, fava, lupin, chickpea, bean, among others) and correlate these with extensional rheological parameters and thermal softening ("melting"). We will also determine how processing the proteins changes their physical state and thus functionality. The ultimate aim is that any protein can be manipulated to work well as a filler in a cheese analogue matrix. This will be very useful for industry since there is less reliance on one or two specific ingredients, allowing for optimization of nutrition, sensory experience, functionality, and cost. Daiya is the #1 North American brand in the vegan cheese category. The technology developed here will ensure continued success and help them become the leading worldwide brand in the category.