Flavour encapsulation and controlled release – a review

Summary Flavours can be among the most valuable ingredients in any food formula. Even small amounts of some aroma substance can be expensive, and because they are usually delicate and volatile, preserving them is often a top concern of food manufacturers. Encapsulation describes different processes to cover an active compound with a protective wall material and it can be employed to treat flavours so as to impart some degree of protection against evaporation, reaction, or migration in a food. Encapsulation of flavours has been attempted and commercialized using many different methods such as spray drying, spray chilling or spray cooling, extrusion, freeze drying, coacervation and molecular inclusion. The choice of appropriate microencapsulation technique depends upon the end use of the product and the processing conditions involved in the manufacturing product. This overview describes each method cited above in terms of the basic chemical and/or physical principles involved and covers mechanisms of flavour release from food matrices.