Morinaga Co. Ltd.

Gorou Kuwata

Masatake Imai

Naoko Murayama

A process for producing soybean protein comprising the step of adding to a soybean protein-containing raw material an aqueous solution of 0.05 to 3.0% by weight of an inorganic salt to form a suspension, causing soybean protein to dissolve in the suspension with adjustment of the pH thereof to 7.5 to 9.0 to form a suspension extract, and removing insoluble components from the suspension extract to obtain an extract; the step of subjecting the extract to acid precipitation with adjustment of the salt concentration thereof to from 0.2 to 1.0% by weight and the pH thereof to 5.0 to 5.7, to collect an acid precipitate; and the step of washing carried out at least once by adding water or an aqueous solution of not more than 1.0% by weight of an inorganic salt to the acid precipitate to form a dispersion, and stirring the dispersion with adjustment of the pH thereof to from 5.0 to 5.7, to collect a precipitate. In place of the washing step, the precipitate obtained by the acid precipitation may be again dissolved to again make acid precipitation. As an advantage of the process, phytic acid and salts thereof can be efficiently removed even when extracted using an aqueous inorganic salt solution with a very low concentration.

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Yokosuka, Japan

Gorou Kuwata