Food or edible material: processes – compositions – and products – Product with added vitamin or derivative thereof for...
Reexamination Certificate
2001-07-20
2004-09-07
Pratt, Helen (Department: 1761)
Food or edible material: processes, compositions, and products
Product with added vitamin or derivative thereof for...
C426S074000, C426S518000, C426S519000, C426S649000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06787169
ABSTRACT:
The present invention relates to a physiological food salt product which primarily consists of minerals and in whose formulation an alkaline earth metal component or components are brought to an appropriate form with acceptable taste and hygroscopic properties. The invention also relates to the use of a salt product prepared according to the method.
In the preparation, preservation or seasoning of foods in a variety of cases, with respect to the use of food salt products, it is presently an important aim to avoid excessive inclusion of common salt, i.e. sodium chloride, NaCl, in the formulation of the food product. The reason for this attempt is the clearly documented harmful effect of NaCl on human health. When the daily consumption of NaCl by a person in the Western countries is estimated to be 170 meq (9.9 g), morbidity on arterial hypertension and mortality on myocardial infarction are common even with daily intake of 100 meq (5.8 g). When the daily dose is less than 50 meq (2.9 g), morbidity is indicated to be low. Consequently, the above-mentioned value 50 meq per day can be considered the recommended maximum daily intake of NaCl.
It has been found in different cases that a daily intake of magnesium, Mg, reduces blood pressure. The recommended dietary allowance (RDA) indicated for magnesium is 4.5 mg/kg/day, resulting in calculated values of 350 to 400 mg per day for adult male population and 280 to 300 mg per day for women, correspondingly. For the above-mentioned reasons, there is a strong need to develop a substitute or modification for common salt, which will fulfill not only the physiological recommended values but also other requirements, such as taste and good sprinklability in its most common form of usage.
The RDA value for calcium, Ca, is indicated to be 800 to 1200 mg per day for adult population. Although the supply of calcium is often sufficient, particularly when the diet is based on milk products, it can be considered appropriate to include calcium in table salt, for example due to an increased need of Ca during pregnancy or during adolescence.
To combine physiologically sufficient alkaline earth contents with food salt formulations has been problematic in practice, primarily because other salts than chlorides (sulphates, phosphates, carbonates, etc.) can hardly be used because of their physiological unsuitability, bitter taste and/or poor solubility.
When alkaline earth metal chlorides are added to food salt in connection with the preparation process, one must, however, solve in a satisfactory manner their strong hygroscopicity, which means the tendency of deliquescence of the product under the effect of humidity in the air. Furthermore, the taste of these chlorides is pungently salty and thus too different from the taste of NaCl.
The same properties apply to carnallite, MgCl
2
×KCl×6H
2
O, present in natural salt deposits which normally contains such quantities of coprecipitated bromides that its nutritional use as such is out of question.
Upon studying the prior art related to the invention, it is found that the development of table salt products has recently been focused on products containing potassium, K, or potassium and magnesium, K and Mg, whereby the main purpose is to reduce the intake of sodium, Na, in food, the main criteria for commercial utilization being acceptable taste. Consequently, methods have been introduced to prepare such mixtures of NaCl, KCl and MgCl
2
in which MgCl
2
or its potassium double salt imitating the natural carnallite is protected from air humidity by means of alkali metal chlorides. Two patent applications that are close to these subjects should be mentioned, WO A1 92/16117 (A23L 1/237) and WO A1 92/18668 (A23L 1/237). Of these, the former presents a method for coating the hygroscopic component of the salt with a non-hygroscopic material. The latter patent application presents a method for treatment of NaCl-K/Mg salts, which method comprises quick drying of the solution prepared of the salts and is intended for producing a stable multi-component salt mixture.
Patent application WO 90/00522 (A23L 1/237) describes a synthetic method for preparing a salt which imitates carnallite for a food salt product by evaporating a solution which contains potassium chloride and magnesium chloride in equivalent ratios and by heat treatment of the obtained evaporation residue to stabilize the product. However, it is industrially impractical to remove scale deposits from the evaporating apparatus, and the method cannot thus be realized as a continuous process. Moreover, it has been found in check-up studies relating to the method that a dried evaporation residue obtained with e.g. a rotatory evaporator is as hygroscopic as natural carnallite, and that as a result of the heat treatment, hydrochloric acid is emitted from the product, which results in that the solubility of the product to water, the pH of the solution, and thereby its taste are changed to the adverse direction.
Aalso patent application WO 88/09131 (A23L 1/237) should be mentioned as related to the invention. The application presents a salt substitute which contains 50% of free ammonium chloride NH
4
Cl admixed mechanically to phosphates and sugar which adjust the acidity of the 20 product. Continuous use of the product according to the formulation may, however, be physiologically doubtful, because the calculatory ammonium content will thus rise to a level of 16.8%.
Furthermore, as prior art connected with the invention, two Finnish patent applications should be mentioned, No. 961229 and No. 970323, as well as international application WO 98/32343 (A23L 1/237) related to the latter, in which, to eliminate the hygroscopicity, an amino acid complex is formed from alkaline earth chlorides, particularly with glycine, which is also the simplest amino acid. However, a closer study of the technique presented in the patents has revealed that the aims of the patents cannot be achieved to the described extent, for the following reasons.
For example, MgCl
2
×6H
2
O forms three different complexes with glycine, which have been found to be in a balance with each other according to the following equation:
For example, a compound prepared with equivalent ratios of MgCl
2
and glycine is thus normally a mixture which does not fulfill the criterion of hygroscopicity at high air humidity values. Moreover, it is not possible to isolate amino acid complexes from a concentrated solution by centrifugation, but the solution must be fully evaporated, which complicates industrial production. Furthermore, it seems that adverse changes take place in the taste and colour of the final product even in a short time interval, possibly due to oxidation of the organic component.
In any case, none of the products according to any of the above-mentioned applications fulfills all the requirements set above for the invention. The same applies to commercially available Na-K-Mg table salts, examples of which include the almost identical products Seltine® and Pan Salt® whose composition comprises the compounds NaCl, KCl and MgSO
4
×7H
2
O (12%) in a mechanical mixture. When the intake of magnesium is calculated from e.g. the above-mentioned commercial products with an average daily use of 7.5 g, the daily dose obtained for magnesium is 88 mg, which is fully insufficient in view of the above-mentioned recommended values. In these products, the hygroscopic properties are under control, but it has not been possible to eliminate the disadvantages of the sulphate, of which an increased excretion of calcium possibly caused by the sulphate ion should be mentioned. Furthermore, analyses of the compositions of both products have revealed MgSO
4
contents differing from the given values, which may be primarily due to the fact that this salt has a different crystalline form and density than the alkali metal chlorides, which results in the separation of magnesium sulphate from the mixture.
It is disclosed in prior art that ammonium carnallite type compounds of alkaline earth metals, particularly th
Franklin Eric J.
Pratt Helen
Venable LLP
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