Development and Validation of an Analytical Method for Betanine and Isobetanine in Processed Food Products Labeled with Beet Red

Red beet (Beta vulgaris L.) is a root vegetable and a popular functional food ingredient of dark red-purple appearance due largely to betacyanins, principally betanine (75-95%) and its isomer, isobetanine (15-45%).
This study developed an analytical method for beet red in terms of betanine and isobetanine in processed food products labeled with beet red as a food additive. High Performance Liquid Chromatography-Diode Array Detector (HPLC-DAD) was used with a C18 column. Linearity, limit of detection (LOD), limit of quantitation (LOQ), accuracy, precision and uncertainty in measurement were calculated for method validation. Matrix-matched calibration was applied to the candy, ice cream, and cocoa product, respectively, and R2 was ≥0.9998, showing a high level of linearity.
The LOD and LOQ were 0.16 to 0.32 and 0.48 to 0.97 mg/L, respectively. As a result of repeated intra-day and interday experiments to validate the accuracy and precision of the analytical method, the recovery rates were 96.0-103.1% and 100.0-102.2%, respectively and the RSD% was 0.5-3.3% and 0.9-3.8%, respectively. Moreover, the measurement uncertainty was estimated to be 1.71-12.43% depending on the matrix and the measured concentration. In this study, betanine and isobetanine were quantified (8.4-3,823.4 mg/kg) by applying the developed analytical method to processed food products (n = 26; e.g., candy, ice cream, and other processed foods) labeled with beet red as a food additive.