Mushroom-based Northern Thai style sausages: Physico-chemical, nutritional profile and in vitro digestibility

The aim of this research was to develop mushroom–based Northern Thai style sausage (NS). Four mushrooms; split gill (SG), shiitake, oyster (OM) and log white (LW) were screened for NS preparation. Composition analysis suggested that LW had significantly higher amount of protein, fat and ash. LW showed significantly higher amounts of essential amino acids, total polyphenol, and DPPH activity. However, FRAP value was higher in the SG. LW was selected for further processing of NS based on nutritional analysis. LW-NS had higher nutritional value than commercial NS, but lower than northern Thai style beef sausages (NBS). Textural properties of LW-NS are comparable with NBS, but better than commercial NS. The LW-NS showed better (p < 0.05) consumer acceptability than commercial NS. The in vitro digestibility shows that both LW- and SG-NS remained reasonably steady in the gastric stage, but dramatically increased throughout the intestinal digesting stage. LW-NS provides 34, 32, 44, 10 and 20% of recommended daily intake (RDI) for protein, dietary fiber, sodium, calcium and iron, respectively. This study finds that LW-NS may be a good and sustainable alternative to animal-based NS, perhaps leading to increased consumer acceptance as meat alternatives.