Taming of the Golden Bean
Rajendra P. Gupta
ProSoya Inc.
2-5310 Canotek Road, Ottawa, Canada K1J 9N5

For time immemorial, soybean has been known as the best source of plant protein and is rich in nutritive minerals and dietary fiber. Recently, nutraceutical aspects of the bean have become well recognized even in the western world. Foods derived from soybean have been shown to selectively lower the bad cholesterol and aid in reducing the chances of developing cancer. In women, soyfoods consumption minimizes the menopause symptoms. For this reason and because of its color, soybean is aptly referred as the Golden Bean.
The use of soybean in foods has been rather limited outside the Orient, mainly due to the rancid-oil-like taste problem of such foods, especially those derived from soymilk. This bad taste is imparted by the catalytic action of lipoxygenase enzyme in synthesizing off-flavor causing volatiles from lipids in the bean in the presence of water and oxygen. Until recently, the only successful way of combating the offflavor problem was to kill the lipoxygenase enzyme, such as by thermal and/or chemical treatment. However, killing the enzyme is like treating cancer; for the process also adversely affects a lot of good protein cells, making the extraction of soluble protein in water very difficult.
The Golden Bean was finally tamed with the invention of a natural process in which the soybeans are ground in water in the absence of air at a temperature that is too low to adversely affect the lipoxygenase enzyme and the proteins. This air-less cold-grind process permits the soluble solids in soybean to easily dissolve or make a colloid in water. Any heat treatment necessary to make the product digestible is performed only after air-less cold-grind step. It results in clean tasting soymilk without the characteristic chalkiness imparted by