From Biorefinery to Food Product Design: Peach (Prunus persica) By-Products Deserve Attention

Abstract

There is an increasing demand for functional foods to attend the consumers preference for products with health benefits. Peach (Prunus persica), from Rosaceae family, is a worldwide well-known fruit, and its processing generates large amounts of by-products, consisting of peel, stone (seed shell + seed), and pomace, which represent about 10% of the annual global production, an equivalent of 2.4 million tons. Some studies have already evaluated the bioactive compounds from peach by-products, although, the few available reviews do not consider peach by-products as valuable materials for product design methodology. Thereby, a novelty of this review is related to the use of these mostly unexplored by-products as alternative sources of valuable components, encouraging the circular bioeconomy approach by designing new food products. Besides, this review presents recent peach production data, compiles briefly the extraction methods for the recovery of lipids, proteins, phenolics, and fiber from peach by-products, and also shows in vivo study reports on anti-inflammatory, anti-obesity, and anti-cerebral ischemia activities associated with peach components and by-product. Therefore, different proposals to recover bioactive fractions from peach by-products are provided, for further studies on food-product design.

Keywords: Bioactive ingredients; Circular economy; Design thinking; Sustainable processes.

Fig. 1

Publications about peach, nectarine, cherry, apricot and plum from 2010 to 2022 according to SCOPUS Database Platform (www.scopus.com). Source: the author

Fig. 2

Processing steps of peach (purée concentrate and canned peach in syrup) and their by-products obtained. Source: The author

Fig. 3

The main compounds and their respective chemical composition structures of the by-products (pomace, peel, and seed). Source: the author

Fig. 4

Methodologies design thinking, double diamond, and multi-criteria reverse engineering approach in food design. Source: the author