Despite its high content of nutritious protein, dried
micro-algae have not gained significant importance as food
or food substitute yet. The major obstacles are the powderlike
consistency of the dried biomass, its dark green colour
and its slightly fishy smell, which limit the incorporation of
the algal material into conventional food stuff. Series of
experiments were run to modify or combine algal material
with known food items, by applying various methods such
as heating, baking, mixing. It was tried for instance to
include algae into bread or noodle preparations. However,
only small amounts could be added into bread before
appearance, dough consistence and taste became unpalatable;
the appearance of the noodles changed to an
unattractive brownish colour. Incorporation of algae into
ravioli-like food items masked the colouring effect, but
also changed the taste considerably. Since it became obvious
soon that these attempts will not solve the problems,
not much work was involved into other methods common
in food processing like for instance bleaching, emulsifying,
gelling, extrusion, etc. And another aspect has to be kept in
mind. In the developing countries, which are actually in
need of protein, additional problems arose because of
socio-ethnological barriers and very conservative food
restrictions against unknown food ingredients.
Last but not the least, the production costs for microalgae
are still too high to compete with conventional
protein sources.
To date, the major sales of micro-algal preparations
can be found in the so-called health food market. The
encapsulated algal powder is sold as panacea against
almost all maladies, except diseases due to protein
malnutrition!