The Maillard Reaction:

The Maillard reaction is occurring for most of cooking: such as caramel, or roasting.

What is Maillard reaction?

The Maillard reaction was first discovered by Louis Camille Maillard and the reaction between carbohydrates (sugar) and proteins, and is responsible for changes in color, flavor and nutritive in food.

The Maillard reaction occurs in three main steps:

  1. initial step: formation N glycoside        
  2. After formation of N glycoside the immonium ion is formed and then isomerize, this reaction is called Amadori rearrangement and forms a compound called ketosamine:

           

The ketosamine products then either dehydrates into reductones and dehydro reductones, which are caramel, or products short chain hydrolytic fission products such as diacetyl, acetol or pyruvaldehyde which then undergo the Strecker degradation.

 

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