The Effect of Persian and Almond Gums as Fat Replacers on Textural and Microstructure Characteristics of LowFat Ultrafiltrated Cheese

Nowadays, the growing demands for low fat foods consumption has resulted in more intensive researches on the preparation of these foods that resemble the original products. The aim of the present study is to optimize the formulation of the ultrafiltrated lowfat Iranian white cheese using fat replacers.
The experiments were planned on the basis of 3-level-3-factor boxBehnken design throughout Response Surface Methodology. The fat content (3-10%), Persian gum (0-0.2%) and almond gum (0-0.2%) were considered as independent variables and texture characteristics of the cheese samples were regarded as responses.
The results indicated that as the amounts of fat (p Response surface optimization showed that desired rheological and textural properties for low-fat Iranian UF-Feta cheese were obtainable using 10% fat, 0.2 Persian gum and 0.14% almond gum. Based on the optimization results, it was revealed that textural defect related to fat reduction might be improved by using local gums, such as Persian and almond gums, in cheese formulation.