Whether you prefer them toasted over a campfire, bobbing in a cup of hot chocolate, or roasted over a bed of sweet potatoes, marshmallows are an ooey-gooey fluffy treat that just finds a way warm the cockles of your heart.
Marshmallows, like other well-known aerated confections – think mousses, ice cream, meringues – are essentially made of four basic components: sugar, water, air, and a hydrocolloid. Hydrocolloids, often called “food gums” are polysaccharides, or typically large-branching proteins, that form thick gels when they interact with water. [1]
Their ability to bind to water molecules makes them hydrophilic (or “water-loving”), and their ability to remain suspended and dispersed evenly in the water (without settling to the bottom) makes the substance a colloid. Thus, food gums are hydrophilic colloids, or hydrocolloids.
Hydrocolloids are added to many foods we eat – as thickening agents in pie fillings or gravies, gelling agents in puddings and jams, foam stabilizers in beer and meringues, film formers in sausage casings, emulsifiers in salad dressing, and even fat replacers in frostings and muffins. Common examples of hydrocolloids are starch, xanthan gum, locust bean gum, alginate, pectin, carrageenan, and agar, which all influence the texture and mechanical stability of many foods. [1][2]
