The aim of this study was to assess the functional properties of butters, spreadable fats, and shortenings, collected from the Czech market, in correlation with their nutritional values declared by the producers. Various methods were applied to determine relevant parameters of the products. Using penetration tests, samples were characterized by specific textural attributes according to their composition and processing type, particularly for the presence of milk/vegetable fats. Using differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), thermal peaks corresponding to medium- and high-melting triacylglycerol fractions were detected in the ranges 15-16 °C and 31.5-34.5 °C, respectively. Rheological analysis revealed that the viscoelasticity of samples was related to frequency behavior of the fat structure, characterized by the dominance of elastic modulus (G') over viscous modulus (G″) up to the frequency of 10 Hz. This indicated good emulsion stability of the products in the region of linear viscoelasticity. For spreadable fats, the structure was resistant to phase separation in the whole frequency range under study (0.1-100 Hz). The results showed that the applied techniques can be successfully used to characterize the processing and compositional quality of butters and vegetable fats.
Keywords: butters; differential scanning calorimetry; fluorescence spectrometry; free fatty acids; rheology; shortenings; spreadable fats; texture profile analysis.