Corn and cassava flours can replace wheat flour in gluten-free fish fingers

The aim of this work was to develop and to characterize fish fingers prepared with mechanically separated meat of hybrid surubim, with and without gluten. Four treatments were evaluated by varying the three steps of pre-dusting, battering, and breading. They have included wheat flour (T1), fishmeal (T2), corn flour (T3) or a blend of corn flour and cassava flour (T4). Characterization was carried out in terms of chemical, physical, microbiological, and sensory analyzes. Moisture content of the samples varied from 59.73% (T3) to 61.14% (T1), protein from 10.60% (T3) to 14.25% (T2), crude fiber from 11.00 to 11.42%, lipid from 4.42 (T1) to 10.91% (T2), and ash from 1.96% (T3) to 2.60% (T2). The highest breading yield (27.15%) coincided with the lowest shear strength (5.75 N) for T1. A darker color was observed for T2, which was prepared with fish meal. The average scores of the sensory attributes ranged from 6.12 to 7.50. All treatments presented acceptance indexes above 70%, except for the color attribute of T2. The purchase intentions for “certainly would purchase” and “possibly would purchase” were 82, 64, 72, and 72% for T1, T2, T3, and T4, respectively, with a rejection index ranging from 6 to 14%. It was concluded that treatments with corn flour (T3) and the mixture 1:1 of corn flour and cassava flour (T4) are good alternatives to replace wheat flour (T1), favoring celiac consumers.