Changes in carotenoids and tocols of colored-grain wheat during unleavened bread preparation

Abstract The content of carotenoids and tocols in the individual steps of technological processing was determined using HPLC-DAD and HPLC-FLD. The dough preparation resulted in a more pronounced loss of the investigated antioxidants (51.5 and 33.0%) compared to baking (22.5 and 9.1%). Carotenoids appear to be markedly less stable than tocols, as only 26.0% compared to 57.9% of the initial flour content was preserved in the final product, accounting for 0.81 and 29.4 μg/g. In the dough preparation phase, a strong correlation (R = 0.693, p ≤ 0.001) was noted between the tocol content in the flour and the share of retained carotenoids in the dough, indicating a protective effect of tocols on carotenoids. In total, a similar overall retention of carotenoids, as in the leavened bun preparation (27.4%), was found, since the differences in shape of the final product turn out to cause increased carotenoid losses due to high baking temperatures in flatbread.