Tuna Paste
Tuna paste is a concentrated seafood flavour base produced by hydrolysing and reducing tuna muscle, trimmings and cooking liquor into a viscous savoury concentrate used as a flavour ingredient rather than as a food eaten in its own right.
Its savoury strength comes from the free amino acids and nucleotides released when the fish protein is broken down, in particular glutamic acid and inosine monophosphate, which act together and give tuna extracts a savoury intensity out of proportion to their dose. Small peptides contribute body, while the marine character rests on volatile aldehydes and sulphur compounds derived from the fish oil fraction, which is largely but never completely removed during processing. Residual fat and trimethylamine decide how the paste smells on storage.
The finished material is a light to mid brown paste, sometimes grey brown where dark muscle predominates, with a total solids content high enough to make it shelf stable when salted. It disperses in hot water with agitation and blends into sauces and emulsions, though it is not a clear soluble extract and will leave a fine suspended residue. Prolonged heating drives off the marine top notes and darkens the paste, so it is normally dosed late in a process.
We source bulk Tuna Paste from top China manufacturers for our partners. The manufacturer is in Zhejiang. A smaller requirement can ship in a combined container with other ingredients.
Please send the grade you need, the volume and your destination port, and we will come back with a solution and a price.
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- Function
- Flavours and Aromas
Specifications
| Item | Specification |
|---|---|
| Appearance | Light to mid brown viscous paste, homogeneous |
| Odour and taste | Characteristic cooked tuna aroma, savoury, free of putrid or rancid note |
| Total solids | Not less than 55.0% |
| Crude protein on dry basis | Not less than 60.0% |
| Amino acid nitrogen | Not less than 1.5 g/100 g |
| Fat | Not more than 5.0% |
| Sodium chloride | 8.0 to 20.0% |
| pH of a 1 in 20 dilution | 5.5 to 6.5 |
| Histamine | Not more than 50 mg/kg |
| Lead | Not more than 1.0 mg/kg |
| Mercury | Not more than 0.5 mg/kg |
| Total plate count | Not more than 10,000 cfu/g |
| Yeast and mould | Not more than 100 cfu/g |
| Salmonella | Absent in 25 g |
Common Markets Grades
Grades separate first by raw material. A grade made from light muscle trimmings is paler and milder and commands a premium for use in retail sauces, while a grade built on dark muscle and canning cook water is stronger, darker and cheaper and goes into industrial seasoning and petfood. Producers also distinguish a straight extract, in which nothing but fish, water and salt is used, from a compounded base carrying yeast extract, salt, sugar and flavour enhancers to standardise savoury intensity.
The second split is form and concentration. Pastes are quoted at solids contents typically between fifty and seventy percent and are traded frozen or ambient depending on salt level, liquid concentrates at lower solids serve central kitchens, and spray dried powders on a maltodextrin carrier are made for dry seasoning blends. Deodorised and decolourised grades, treated with activated carbon to strip the strongest marine notes, are specified where the tuna character has to sit behind other flavours. Histamine controlled grades with a tightened specification are quoted for markets that enforce a low limit.
Applications
- Seafood soup and noodle broth bases, where the nucleotide content multiplies the savoury effect of added glutamate
- Instant noodle and cup product sachets carrying a fish or seafood profile
- Bottled sauces and dressings such as tuna mayonnaise, caesar style dressings and seafood dipping sauces
- Savoury snack seasoning for fish crackers, prawn crackers and coated nuts, usually in the dried form
- Surimi and fish ball products, restoring the fish character lost when white fish paste is washed and refined
- Ready meals, risotto and pasta sauce bases where a marine background note is wanted without visible fish
- Reaction flavour production, as the amino acid rich precursor stream for seafood process flavourings
- Petfood palatants and wet cat food gravies, the largest volume outlet for dark muscle grades
- Aquaculture feed attractants, where the same hydrolysate stimulates feeding response
China Manufacturers of Tuna Paste
Top Tuna Paste manufacturers in China.
Company names and logos are the property of the manufacturers themselves. They are listed here because our own directory records them as producing this ingredient. A listing is not an endorsement by them, and we do not represent them or speak on their behalf.
Regulatory Status
In the United States tuna paste is a fishery product, so it is manufactured and imported under the seafood hazard analysis and critical control point regulation in 21 CFR Part 123, which requires the processor to identify and control the hazards specific to scombroid species. Histamine formation is the main hazard, and the Food and Drug Administration operates published defect action and guidance levels for histamine in tuna that a processor is expected to design the temperature control programme around. Fish is one of the major food allergens under the Food Allergen Labelling and Consumer Protection Act, so the species has to be declared. Any flavour enhancers compounded into the base are separately generally recognised as safe.
In the European Union the product is of animal origin, so the establishment must be approved and listed under Regulation (EC) No 853/2004 and consignments enter through a border control post with the corresponding health certificate. Histamine criteria for fishery products from species associated with a high histidine content are set in the microbiological criteria regulation, Regulation (EC) No 2073/2005, and apply to material of this type. Fish must be declared as an allergen under Regulation (EU) No 1169/2011. Codex covers the material through its standard for fish and fishery products and the associated code of practice, which also addresses histamine control.
Manufacturing Process
The feedstock is tuna muscle, red meat trimmings and the protein rich cooking liquor drained from the pre cooking stage of canning. It is minced, adjusted to a working solids content with water and heated to the optimum temperature for a food grade protease, usually an alkaline or neutral bacterial enzyme, which is held at controlled pH for a period of hours to cleave the muscle protein into peptides and free amino acids. The enzyme is then destroyed by a short high temperature hold, which also pasteurises the batch.
The hydrolysate is separated in a decanter and a disc centrifuge into an oil fraction, a solid bone and scale fraction and a clarified liquor. The liquor may be passed over activated carbon to lighten the colour and reduce the strongest marine volatiles, and in many plants it is reacted with reducing sugars and amino acids to develop cooked notes. It is then concentrated in a falling film or forced circulation vacuum evaporator to paste solids, standardised with salt and any compounded components, homogenised, hot filled and cooled, or alternatively spray dried on a carrier for the powder grade.
