# Development of a New Pasta Product by the Incorporation of Chestnut Flour and Bee Pollen
## 3 Results and Discussion  
### Optimization of Pasta Formulation  
The cooking time and cooking yield of pasta containing water and different percentages of chestnut flour are presented in Table 5. The optimum cooking time for all formulations of fresh pasta ranged from 10 to 5 min, respectively, for FC2 with 0% and 55% of chestnut flour. The reduction of optimal cooking time with the incorporation of chestnut flour could be due to decreased gluten content and discontinuity in the gluten network, promoting a faster moisture penetration of water into samples with lower protein content [54]. In the same line, the cooking yield was affected by the presence of chestnut flour in pasta formulations. However, the addition of 25% or 30% of chestnut flour was not enough to modify the solids loss and absorption of water in cooking, maintaining a cooking yield around 220% for both formulations. For the mixtures of 40%, 50% and 55% chestnut flour, the cooking yield (mass of cooked pasta/mass of uncooked pasta) decreased to around 175%, resulting in a higher cooking loss. Similarly, higher cooking loss was reported with the addition of an increasing percentage of chestnut flour (20-40%) in fresh pasta [24]. The presence of chestnut flour in the pasta formulations could have affected a proper gluten network development due to the lower amount of gluten proteins and higher amount of \begin{table}
\begin{tabular}{l c c c c c c} \hline \hline
**Formulation with Water** & **FC2** & **FC2-C25** & **FC2-C30** & **FC2-C40** & **FC2-C50** & **FC2-C55** \\
**\% of Chestnut flour 1** & **0\%** & **25\%** & **30\%** & **40\%** & **50\%** & **55\%** \\ \hline
**FRESH** & & & & & & \\ Mass of fresh pasta (g) & 31.61 & 37.65 & 36.51 & 38.59 & 35.88 & 37.26 \\ Mass of cooked pasta (g) & 63.43 & 81.71 & 83.60 & 67.58 & 64.11 & 65.00 \\ Cooking time (mins) & 10:00 & 6:55 & 6:40 & 5:30 & 5:15 & 5:00 \\ Cooking yield (\%) & 201 & 217 & 229 & 175 & 179 & 174 \\ \hline
**DRIED** & & & & & & \\ Mass of fresh pasta (g) & 56.12 & 52.32 & 52.74 & 41.85 & 46.41 & 49.51 \\ Mass of dried pasta (g) & 32.19 & 33.29 & 35.59 & 28.04 & 31.22 & 32.89 \\ Drying loss (\%) & 57 & 64 & 67 & 67 & 67 & 66 \\ Mass of cooked pasta (g) & 76.19 & 71.06 & 83.35 & 58.98 & 69.19 & 81.01 \\ Cooking time (mins) & 11:58 & 7:17 & 646 & 6:30 & 7:44 & 9:00 \\ Cooking yield (\%) & 237 & 213 & 234 & 210 & 222 & 246 \\ \hline
**Formulation with Egg** & **FC4** & **FC4-C25** & **FC4-C30** & **FC4-C40** & **FC4-C50** & **FC4-C55** \\
**\% of Chestnut flour 1** & **0\%** & **25\%** & **30\%** & **40\%** & **50\%** & **55\%** \\ \hline
**FRESH** & & & & & & \\ Mass of fresh pasta (g) & 32.98 & 37.31 & 35.40 & 38.09 & 39.02 & 38.04 \\ Mass of cooked pasta (g) & 60.00 & 66.72 & 61.96 & 65.11 & 62.45 & 66.25 \\ Cooking time (mins) & 11:42 & 9:00 & 8:31 & 8:05 & 8:00 & 8:00 \\ Cooking yield (\%) & 182 & 179 & 175 & 171 & 160 & 174 \\ \hline
**DRIED** & & & & & & \\ Mass of fresh pasta (g) & 55.42 & 53.69 & 53.54 & 46.71 & 55.75 & 57.02 \\ Mass of dried pasta (g) & 38.68 & 36.21 & 37.87 & 30.88 & 25.49 & 28.95 \\ Drying loss (\%) & 70 & 67 & 71 & 66 & 46 & 51 \\ Mass of cooked pasta (g) & 93.41 & 88.38 & 83.33 & 81.58 & 82.18 & 72.47 \\ Cooking time (mins) & 17.25 & 16:12 & 15.00 & 14:00 & 14:00 & 18.00 \\ Cooking yield (\%) & 241 & 244 & 220 & 264 & 322 & 250 \\ \hline \hline \end{tabular}  
* Defined in relation to the total flour (not including the liquid—water/egg).  
\end{table} 
Table 5: Experiments for pasta containing water or egg plus chestnut flour at variable percentages. fiber and sugar solids that probably competed for gluten hydration. The disrupted or weak starch-gluten network could promote the higher leaching of gelatinized starch from the pasta during cooking and a change of water absorbed during cooking [55]. The drying of fresh pasta (FC2) promoted a drying loss of 55%, but, with the incorporation of chestnut flour, the value increased to around 67%, independently of the percentage of incorporation (25% to 55%).