Improvement of rice bread by the addition of chickpea aquafaba

Despite current interests and trends, gluten-free breads such as rice breads cannot achieve the same loaf volumes and desirable textural characteristics as their wheat counterparts. Aquafaba (AQ), protein-rich wastewater from cooking legumes, with chickpeas being the most widely studied, shows promise for enhancing bakery product quality as a novel clean ingredient. Rice bread was prepared using four rice varieties chosen due to their varying amylose contents: Hoshiyutaka (HO), Mizuhochikara (MZ), Hinohikari (HI), and Milky Queen (MQ). In the bread formulation, water was substituted with aquafaba foam at 0 %, 50 %, and 100 % (w/w). Aquafaba application increased the loaf volume in samples made from HI, MZ, and HO. No differences were detected for MQ samples. With the increase in the AQ percentage, bread samples exhibited a more open crumb structure, characterized by larger cells. HO, MZ, and HI samples with AQ substitution showed significantly lower hardness values throughout the 3 days analyzed. Higher amylose cultivars showed larger hardness differences with the application of AQ. Not all samples displayed significant differences between 50 % and 100 % AQ. In conclusion, AQ can positively impact rice bread's loaf volume and textural characteristics even with a 50 % substitution.