Dairy Ingredients for Food Processing

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Chapter 8

Whey - based Ingredients

Lee M. Huffman and Lilian de Barros Ferreira

Introduction

According to the Food and Drug
Administration Code (Title 21 CFR Section
184.1979), whey is the liquid substance
obtained by separating the coagulum from
milk, cream, or skim milk in cheese making.
Whey also may be obtained from curd forma-
tion by the direct acidifi cation of milk (casein
manufacture). Figure 8.1 shows a simplifi ed
fl ow diagram for the production of whey,
lactose, and whey ingredients.
It is estimated that more than 90% of
whey originates from cheese making and that
less than 10% originates from casein produc-
tion (Affertsholt and Nielsen 2007 ). During
cheese manufacture, 10 kg of milk generates
roughly 1 kg of cheese and 9 kg of whey. The
whey stream contains approximately 6%
solids, mainly lactose, minerals, whey pro-
teins, fat, and byproducts of cheese (or
casein) manufacture. The quality and compo-
sition of the whey stream vary, depending on
the type of cheese (or casein) being produced
and manufacturing practices (Patel et al.
1990 , De la Fuente et al. 2002 ).
In 1959, only 27% of the total whey pro-
duced was used by the food industry (animal
and human). Whey has a high chemical
oxygen demand (COD; 73 to 86 kg/m^3 ) and
a high biochemical oxygen demand (BOD;
38 – 46 kg/m^3 ); environmental concerns and

regulations have reduced the amount of whey

that can be disposed (Bullerman and Berry

1966 , Farizoglu et al. 2004 ). By 2006 the

industrial utilization of whey was around

80% in the United States and Canada, 60%

in the European Union, 90% in Oceania, 40%

in Brazil and Argentina, and 25% in the rest

of the world.

Industrial use of whey is vital to the eco-

nomic feasibility of the dairy industry in

developed countries. In addition to the rele-

vance of environmental concerns relating to

whey disposal, the nutritional and functional

properties of whey ingredients make whey a

valuable product (Figure 8.2 ).

Technological advances in ultrafi ltration

since the early 1980s have allowed the devel-

opment of the various whey products shown

in Figure 8.1. The industrial use of whey

began no more than 30 to 40 years ago, with

ongoing research on product properties and

creation of value - added whey ingredients of

increasing relevance (Abd El - Salam et al.

2009 ). Recent technological advances in both

membrane and chromatography technology

have opened the way for further purifi cation

and fractionation of whey ingredients. The

introduction of ceramic (Maubois and

Ollivier 1991 ) and polymeric (Zulewska

et al. 2009 ) microfi ltration membranes has

allowed the separation of whey proteins from

casein proteins directly from milk, thus creat-

ing a new product of greater value.

In Figure 8.2 the size of the bubble is

proportional to the commercial value of the

whey or lactose ingredient; values vary

Dairy Ingredients for Food Processing edited by
Ramesh C. Chandan and Arun Kilara
© 2011 Blackwell Publishing Ltd.