Aspartame is a non-nutritive sweetener. Sweetener is an important food additive, which imparts sweetness to food, improves food taste and improves food quality.
Aspartame imparts sweetness to foods; it can also be used as a flavor enhancer. The calorific value of aspartame is only 4186 kJ/kg, which is 1/200 of that of sucrose. It has a strong sweet taste. The sweetness of its dilute solution is about 100 to 200 times that of sucrose. The solubility in water is approximately 1% and the solubility in ethanol is 0.26 mg/dL. It is very stable at room temperature and weak acid (pH 3~5), and will decompose under long-term high temperature and strong alkali conditions.
After aspartame enters the human body orally, three common metabolites of aspartic acid, phenylalanine and methanol are produced under the action of intestinal esterase and peptidase. Its amino acid products can participate in normal amino acid metabolism. Methanol levels are extremely low and metabolized rapidly at this time, often barely detectable in the blood after ingestion of aspartame.
Aspartame can be widely used in milk, jam, cakes, condiments, beverages, jelly, puffed food and other dairy products.
Application Field of Aspartame
1. Aspartame is a new type of amino acid high-intensity sweetener, which is a dipeptide compound composed of L-aspartic acid and L-phenylalanine. It doesn't have the bitter, chemical, or metallic taste of other artificial sweeteners. Aspartame enhances fruit flavors and reduces coffee bitterness. It can effectively reduce calories without causing dental caries, and has a similar metabolic effect to protein.
2. Aspartame has the characteristics of good flavor, high sweetness, low calorific value, safety and reliability, and can be widely used in carbonated drinks, fruit pulp drinks, jams, fruit-flavored powders, instant coffee, frozen dairy products, and soft candies. Aspartame can also be made into granules, tablets, powder or juice and added directly to everyday sweets as a substitute for sucrose.