Barley pearling by-products used to make high-folate pasta and biscuits
What it found
Pasta and biscuits made with flour from barley pearling by-products contained more folate than most unfortified commercial grain products, and the pasta held onto more folate after cooking than folic acid-fortified pasta.
The work was done in the lab on foods, not in people.
What they found
Barley cultivar folate
Folate content varied among the 19 Italian barley cultivars, from 39.8 to 78.9 micrograms per 100 grams dry matter. Natura had the highest level and was chosen for the next steps.
Pearling by-product folate
The second pearling by-product (BP2) had 221.7 micrograms of folate per 100 grams fresh weight, more than three times the level in the original barley caryopsis. The first by-product had 173.5 and the third had 177 micrograms per 100 grams.
Enriched pasta folate
Uncooked pasta made with the barley by-product flour had 87.1 micrograms of folate per 100 grams, higher than commercial unfortified pasta (average 39.2) and whole wheat pasta (average 60.4). After cooking, it had 26.1 micrograms per 100 grams, higher than the unfortified pastas but slightly lower than folic acid-fortified pasta (30.7).
Folate retention after cooking
The enriched pasta kept 68.5% of its folate after cooking, compared with 49.0% for commercial whole-meal pasta, 56.2% for semolina pasta, and 27.8% for folic acid-fortified pasta.
Enriched biscuits folate
The new biscuits had 70.1 micrograms of folate per 100 grams, about 5 times more than the commercial biscuit with the highest folate level and 10 times more than the lowest. This was slightly higher than folic acid-fortified biscuits (62.1 micrograms per 100 grams).
What the authors conclude
“This research shows promising results concerning the pearling technique to design new cereal products naturally enriched in folates.”
Also in their conclusions
- They conclude that the barley pearling technique was effective at obtaining folate-rich flours.
- They state that the pasta and biscuits newly designed in this study showed a very high folate content, especially if compared with the ones unfortified already on the market and with levels similar to folic acid-fortified foods.
- They suggest that new products naturally enriched in folate could contribute to an improvement in folate nutritional status and decrease risk of congenital anomalies and cardiovascular and neurodegenerative diseases.
How it was done
Folate deficiency is widespread in many countries, and some authors have raised concerns about high intakes of synthetic folic acid. The authors wanted to design cereal products naturally enriched in folate as an alternative to fortified foods.
They screened 19 Italian barley cultivars for folate and chose Natura, which had the highest level. They pearled Natura barley in three steps, collected the by-product flours, and used the second by-product to make pasta and biscuits, then measured folate before and after cooking.
What it can’t tell you
- This study measured folate levels in foods in the lab. It did not test whether eating these products improves folate status in people.
- The authors did not test how well the body absorbs the folate from these new products.
- The long-term health effects of eating these products were not studied.
Who paid
- Conflicts
- The authors declare no conflict of interest associated with this publication.
- Authors work at
- Council for Agricultural Research and Economics (CREA), Italy; Università Campus Bio-Medico di Roma, Italy; Università degli Studi del Molise, Italy
The paper
- Title
- Design of Cereal Products Naturally Enriched in Folate from Barley Pearling By-Products
- Type
- Study
- Summarised from
- Full text
- Cite
- Ruggeri S, De Arcangelis E, Aguzzi A, Messia MC, Marconi E (2022). Design of Cereal Products Naturally Enriched in Folate from Barley Pearling By-Products. Nutrients. doi:10.3390/nu14183729Free full textPubMed 36145105DOI
Summary written 26 Sep 2026. Check it against the paper before it changes what you eat. How we summarise papers · Report an error