Assessing the effectiveness of peanut diacylglycerol oil-ethylcellulose/monoglyceride-based oleogel in sponge cake as a margarine replacer

The aim of this research was to partially substitute margarine with peanut diacylglycerol oil-ethylcellulose/monoglyceride (DAG-EC/MG) oleogel and assess its effect on the texture of sponge cake. Fourier transform infrared spectrometry analysis showed that the carboxyl headgroups of MG could induce van der Waals forces in polar DAG oil, while the glycerol headgroups of MG could induce hydrogen bond interactions with EC in TAG oil. The oil binding capacity (OBC) indicated that all OBC values of DAG-based oleogels were above 95%, which was approximately 20% higher than that of TAG-based oleogels. The morphological analysis showed that the DAG-based oleogel exhibited thinner crystals than the TAG-based oleogel. Differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) analysis demonstrated that the addition of MG could enhance the thermal resistance of DAG-based oleogels. Rheological analysis showed that MG with carboxyl headgroups tended to produce soft gels in polar DAG oil. The hardness of the DAG-based oleogel cake decreased by 88.54% from 20.42 to 2.34 N with the addition of MG, which indicated that MG compensated for the negative influence of EC on the hardness of the DAG-based oleogel cake. The sponge cake with 50% substitution by DAG-based oleogel exhibited satisfactory texture profiles. Additionally, no difference in the overall acceptability was observed between DAG-based oleogels commercial margarine-based cakes. Consequently, DAG-based oleogel cakes are promising bakery products that possess a solid fat content reduction of up to 50% while maintaining bakery product sensory properties.