Investigation on fish surimi gel as promising food material for 3D printing

This paper presents the development of a new 3D printing food constructs based on fish surimi gel system. This study investigated the influence of NaCl addition on rheological property, gel strength, water holding capacity (WHC), water distribution and microstructure of surimi gel to be used as a material for 3D printing. The obtained results from rheological studies showed that the surimi gels made with 1.5 g NaCl/100 g surimi mixture can be used for 3D printing. NaCl addition is helpful for the slurry to flow out from the nozzle in time and then get viscous post-deposition for holding its shape. Moreover, the effects of the printing parameters on the geometrical accuracy and dimension of the printed surimi gel were also studied. In this particular printing system, the 2.0 mm nozzle diameter, 5.0 mm nozzle height, 28 mm/s nozzle moving speed and 0.003 cm3/s extrusion rate were the optimal parameters to print 3D samples with fine resolution, better matching with the target geometry, fewer point defects and no compressed deformation. The overall results suggested that the 3D printing based on surimi gel system is a promising method for producing complexed-shape food patterns.