The first step of the Maillard reaction is the reaction of a reducing sugar, such as glucose, with an amino acid. This reaction is shown in figure 1 below and results in a reaction product called an Amadori compound.
Fig. 1 : The initial step of the Maillard reaction between glucose and an amino acid (RNH2), in which R is the amino acid side group (from ref. 2)
As can be seen in figure 1, the Amadori compounds easily isomerise into three different structures that can react differently in the following steps. As in food generally over 5 different reactive sugars and 20 reactive amino acids are present, only the first step theoretically already results in over 100 different reaction products.
The larger the sugar, the slower it will react with amino acids. The pentose sugars (5 carbon atoms), such as ribose, will react faster as hexose sugars (glucose, fructose) and disaccharides (sugar, lactose). From the amino acids lysine, with two amino groups, reacts the fastest and causes darker colours. Cysteine, with a sulphur group, causes specific flavours, but less colour. Sugar alcohols or polyols (sorbitol, xylitol) do not participate in the Maillard reaction. This means that bakery products sweetened with sorbitol will not or hardly change colour during baking.
The next steps differ, depending on the isomer of the Amadori compound. Either the amino acid is removed, which results in reactive compounds that are finally degraded to the important flavour components furfural and hydroxymethyl furfural (HMF). The other reaction is the so-called Amadori-rearrangement, which is the starting point of the main browning reactions, see figure 2.