ABSTRACT
The purpose of this review is to support breeders and food scientists by examining research carried out on end-user preferences for gari and its derived dough product, eba, in Africa. The review focused on gari regarding the physical and chemical composition of raw cassava roots, methods of storage, the composition of gari with or without enrichment, and the sensory evaluation of gari and eba. The primary sensory attributes identified to describe gari are colour, taste, texture, aroma and flavour. Texture attribute of importance is crispiness for uncooked gari, and hand feel before consumption for eba. There was a significant correlation between the sensory characteristics of gari and the starch and cyanogenic potential (CNP) contents of the raw roots. Hence, the correlation of the end-user preferences with the chemical composition of the cassava roots could be helpful to breeders in refining selection criteria and developing high-throughput screening methods.
ABSTRACT
Lake deposits, plant-based ashes, filtrates and evaporites or alkaline salts are used traditionally in food preparations by local populations in Africa, Asia, South America, and Oceania. Depending on the context, traditional alkaline salts are used to reduce cooking times, improve rheological characteristics of starchy doughs, maintain the color of vegetables, improve the viscosity of sticky vegetables, and act as emulsifiers. This review highlights some of the relationships among chemical composition and physicochemical properties of traditional alkaline salts when used in solution as well as their functionalities. In addition, their potential toxicity and physiological effects are explored, which might lead to a better understanding of some previously unexplained functionalities and future trends in research, such as their impact on human health.