ABSTRACT
Hexoses are widely present in food and undergo partial transformations during the process of cooking, one of the common transformations being dehydration. This chapter enumerates the reported and potential chemical transformations occurring through dehydration of hexoses. It describes the properties of the most common observed hexose dehydration products. D-hexoses have common features, as they possess a carbonyl function. Even though hexose dehydration products are detected in small amounts in food, they prove to be particularly important, noticeably affecting the flavour, colour and nutritional value. Hexoses can also rarely adopt a four-membered ring or a seven-membered ring, named oxetoses and septanoses, respectively.
