Mushrooms: a fortifying agent for wheat bread

Bread is one of the most frequently consumed staple foods worldwide, and its production presents numerous challenges in terms of ensuring quality, shelf life, and nutritional content. In addition to these issues, providing sufficient food for the growing global population in the face of climate change is a major scientific concern. One potential solution to this problem is the exploration of new sources of nutritionally important compounds such as insects, algae, and mushrooms. Building on this, the current study examined the fortification of wheat bread with dry mushrooms. The following three different mushroom species were selected for this study: Agaricus bisporus (a commercially cultivated species), Suilis Luteus, and Boletus Edulis (common wild mushrooms). The mushrooms were dried and used to fortify wheat bread, a common bakery product in Europe. This study utilized two levels of mushroom fortification to prepare bread, which was compared to standard wheat bread. The resulting products were assessed using chemical composition analysis (protein content, fat, ash, and dietary fiber), organoleptic evaluation, and staling assessment (loss of water during storage). The findings indicate that the proposed fortification method has a significant impact on the nutritional value by means of higher dietary fiber content and to extend bread freshness due to bounding water in the loaf. On the other hand, overall baking characteristics, as well as consumer acceptance, remain high when compared to standard bread.