gelatin, animal protein substance having gel-forming properties, used primarily in food products and home cookery, also having various industrial uses. Derived from collagen, a protein found in animal skin and bone, it is extracted by boiling animal hides, skins, bones, and tissue after alkali or acid pretreatment. An easily digested, pure protein food, it is nutritionally an incomplete protein, deficient in certain amino acids. Unflavoured, granulated gelatin, almost tasteless and odourless, ranges from faint yellow to amber in colour. Gelatin is also available as a finely ground mix with added sugar, flavouring, acids, and colouring. When stored in dry form, at room temperature, and in an airtight container, it remains stable for long periods.
Immersed in a liquid, gelatin takes up moisture and swells. When the liquid is warmed, the swollen particles melt, forming a sol (fluid colloidal system) with the liquid that increases in viscosity and solidifies to form a gel as it cools. The gel state is reversible to a sol state at higher temperatures, and the sol can be changed back to a gel by cooling. Both setting time and tenderness are affected by protein and sugar concentration and by temperature.
Gelatin may be whipped to form a foam and acts as an emulsifier and stabilizer. It is used to make such gel foods as jellied meats, soups, and candies, aspics, and molded desserts and to stabilize such emulsion and foam food products as ice cream, marshmallows, and mixtures of oils or fats with water. Fruit jellies resemble gelatin products but achieve solidification as a result of a natural vegetable substance called pectin.
The food industry makes use of most of the gelatin produced. Gelatin is also used by the pharmaceutical industry for the manufacture of capsules, cosmetics, ointments, lozenges, and plasma products and by other industries.