Favorite foods stored in the freezer taste best if they have just the right amount of moisture – neither too wet nor too dry. In the future, invisible edible coatings made from gelatin might provide a new way to make sure water vapor doesn’t wreak havoc with frozen food tastes and textures.
These thin, clear coatings might be made from gelatin extracted from the silvery skins of seagoing fish such as Alaskan pollock, according to Agricultural Research Service (ARS) scientists in Alaska and California who are experimenting with thin sheets of the gelatin. The coatings, which look something like everyday clear plastic wrap, have no seafood taste or odor, despite their marine origin. Food technologists Tara H. McHugh at ARS’s Western Regional Research Center in Albany, CA, and Peter Bechtel at the Subarctic Agricultural Research Center in Fairbanks, AK, and their ARS and university co-investigators are collaborating in the research.
Fish gelatins aren’t new, but the ARS studies apparently are the first to establish the effectiveness of Alaskan pollock gelatin as a barrier. In laboratory tests, the fish gelatin proved a more effective barrier to both unwanted moisture and oxygen than films made from traditional sources – cow and pig hides. Also, the fish gelatin would be acceptable in kosher and Halal cuisine, while the cow and pig gelatins are not, according to McHugh.
Collaborator Roberto de Jesus Avena-Bustillos, formerly with ARS and now at the University of California-Davis, directed the barrier studies.
June 2007 Render