Valorizing Oregano Distillation Wastewater in New Pasta Formulations: Physical, Sensory and Chemical Characteristics

The agro-food industry faces significant environmental and economic challenges due to waste production. To promote sustainability, it is essential to valorize agricultural by-products, such as wastewater from essential oil distillation. Despite being a disposal burden, this wastewater retains valuable compounds with high antioxidant and antibacterial potential, making it an ideal ingredient for functional foods. Given that pasta and bread are daily staples in the Italian diet, they represent a strategic opportunity to improve public nutritional intake. In this study, a novel pasta formulation was developed by replacing 50% or 100% of the processing water with wastewater derived from oregano distillation. The investigation focused on the quality of the cooking process and the composition of phenolic compounds. A sensory analysis was also conducted to assess consumer acceptance. The enriched pasta demonstrated positive sensory characteristics, with an overall appreciation around 7, and higher levels of phenolic compounds (up to 0.79 mg GAE/g) in relation to the control sample (0.14 mgGAE/g). This highlights the potential of these rich raw materials for use in sustainable food and represents a sustainable strategy to improve the nutritional profile of pasta.