Alginate/pectin cold-set gelation as a potential sustainable method for jelly candy production

The reduction of environmental waste emissions and energy consumption in the confectionery industry is desirable. Therefore, this study evaluated the potential of alginate/pectin cold-set gelation technique in the jelly candy manufacturing process. The obtained products were evaluated by scanning electron microscopy and the parameters evaluated were the process energy requirements, sensory acceptance, and physicochemical characteristics (instrumental texture and color, moisture content, pH, and water activity). These parameters were compared to those of a standard pectin jelly candy. The gelling agents considerably influenced the physicochemical parameters of the candies. Alginate/pectin jellies showed a higher hardness value (16.2 N) and an opaque and lighter coloring compared to the pectin jelly candy (6.2 N). There was a dense and homogeneous network with a large amount of pores in cold-set candies, which differed from the sparse network with micelles and large pores in pectin jellies. The energy requirement of the cold-set process (0.013 kWh) was statistically lower than the conventional heating process (0.035 kWh). There was no significant difference (p > 0.05) between the alginate/pectin jellies and pectin candies for all sensory attributes evaluated, indicating that the cold-set gelation technique could be an alternative sustainable technology for the production of jelly candy. •Jelly candies were successfully produced by alginate/pectin cold-set gelation.•The optimized drying step of cold-set candy processing was set to 35 °C/72 h.•Cold-set jellies had no sensorial significant difference between pectin jellies.•Cold-set jellies had a processing energy consumption 2.7 lower than pectin jellies.