What is the Maillard reaction?

Repeat after us… “my-YAR”. That’s how you pronounce ‘Maillard’ in the Maillard reaction. It’s named after Louis-Camille Maillard, a French physician and chemist who first described this process in the early 20th century.

So what is the Maillard reaction exactly? It’s a complex chemical process between amino acids and types of sugar called ‘reducing sugars’, which include glucose, fructose, maltose and lactose. When these sugars and amino acids react, they form melanoidins, which are compounds that give browned foods their flavour, colour and aroma.

In the simplest sense, the Maillard reaction is the process of browning. It makes things alluringly crusty. It deepens flavour, gives colour and creates the delicious smell of roasting, baking and frying. It’s what gives your steak and other meats a lovely umami sear, your bread and potstickers those gorgeously chewy, golden crusts, and cookies that sweet, golden snap. Coffee and cocoa beans also undergo the Maillard reaction during the roasting process, resulting in the tantalisingly deep flavours and aromas many of us can’t live without. The toasty flavours and browned appearance of roasted nuts, the sweetening of grilled, fried and roasted veggies, the addictive golden crunch of hot fries, and even the roasted, malty notes in beer… these are all the result of the Maillard reaction in action. 

So the next time you catch a whiff of a cake baking or salivate over a lovely, well-crusted steak, you can thank amino acids, reducing sugars and heat for doing the right reactive thing.