Patent ID: 7820226

Claim:
A process of preparing a flax protein isolate, which comprises: (a) extracting a flax oil seed meal to cause solubilization of protein in said oil seed meal and to form an aqueous protein solution, (b) separating the aqueous protein solution from the residual oil seed meal, (c) increasing the protein concentration of said aqueous protein solution while maintaining the ionic strength substantially constant by using a selective membrane technique to provide a concentrated protein solution, (d) said concentrated protein solution is warmed to a temperature of at least about 20° C. to decrease the viscosity of the concentrated protein solution but not beyond a temperature above which the temperature of the concentrated protein solution does not permit micelle formation upon subsequent dilution, (e) diluting said concentrated protein solution into chilled water to cause the formation of protein micelles, (f) settling the protein micelles to form an amorphous, sticky, gelatinous, gluten-like protein micellar mass, and (g) recovering the micellar mass from supernatant having a protein content of at least about 90 wt %, as determined by Kjeldahl nitrogen ×6.25 on a dry weight basis.