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RESEARCH ARTICLE

Effect of Oil Content on the Printability of Coconut

Cream

Cheng Pau Lee 1,2† , Jon Yi Hoo , Michinao Hashimoto *
1,2
1†
1 Pillar of Engineering Product Development, Singapore University of Technology and Design, 8 Somapah Rd Singapore
487372, Singapore
2 SUTD-MIT International Design Centre (IDC), Singapore University of Technology and Design, 8 Somapah Rd Singapore
487372, Singapore
† These authors contributed equally to this paper.

Abstract: We developed a method to perform direct ink writing (DIW) three-dimensional (3D) printing of coconut-based
products with high oil content by varying compositions of the coconut oil and the coconut cream. The addition of oils is
particularly crucial in providing energy, developing neurological functions, and improving the palatability of food. Despite
the potential merits of high oil-content foods, there have been limited studies on 3D printing of high oil-content foods. In
particular, the effect of oil content on the printability of food inks has not been studied to date. 3D printing of food inks with
high oil contents is challenging due to oil separation that leads to unpredictable changes in rheological properties. In this work,
we surveyed the behavior of the mixture of the coconut oil and the coconut cream and identified the appropriate conditions for
the food inks that show the printability in DIW 3D printing. We initially formulated coconut cream inks added with coconut
oil that did not exhibit oil separation, and characterized the rheological properties of such inks. We successfully 3D-printed
coconut cream with additional coconut oil and successfully fabricated 3D structures with inks containing 25% water with an
additional 10% (w/w) of coconut oil. Texture profile analysis (TPA) suggested that the hardness index and the chewiness index
of mesh-shaped 3D-printed coconut cream decreased due to an increase in the water content of the ink. Overall, this study
offered an understanding of the stability of the food inks and demonstrated the fabrication of 3D colloidal food with controlled
oil content, which can be applied to formulating foods with tunable oil content to cater to individual nutritional needs without
compromising the stability of the inks.

Keywords: 3D printing; Direct ink writing; 3D food printing; Rheology; Coconut cream; Coconut oil

*Correspondence to: Michinao Hashimoto, Pillar of Engineering Product Development, Singapore University of Technology and Design, 8
Somapah Rd Singapore 487372, Singapore; hashimoto@sutd.edu.sg

Received: March 15, 2021; Accepted: April 10, 2021; Published Online: April 30, 2021
Citation: Lee CP, Hoo JY, Hashimoto M, 2021, Effect of Oil Content on the Printability of Coconut Cream. Int Bioprint,
7(2):354. http://doi.org/10.18063/ijb.v7i2.354

1. Introduction the printability of food inks. Oil is often added to food
ink to achieve desired texture, flavor, and functions, but
This paper describes a method to perform three- the high oil content of the food would alter the property
dimensional (3D) printing of food inks with high oil of food inks by reducing the viscosity and causing phase
content using a direct ink writing (DIW) 3D printer. separation . In this work, we studied the property of food
[7]
We applied this method to 3D print coconut cream ink added with oil to achieve key rheological properties
with additional coconut oil and successfully fabricated and 3D printability.
3D structures with inks containing 25% water with an 3D printing is a method to fabricate 3D models
additional 10% (w/w) coconut oil. While previous works consisting of various materials deposited in a layer-by-
focused on 3D printing of starch-based [1-4] and fiber-based layer manner, and it is applied across multiple fields
inks [5,6] , our work focused on the effect of oil content on to fabricate metal aerospace parts , living organs [9,10] ,
[8]
© 2021 Lee, et al. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial 4.0 International License
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), permitting all non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original
work is properly cited.
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