Preparation of Doum fruit (Hyphaene thebaica) dietary fiber supplemented biscuits: influence on dough characteristics, biscuits quality, nutritional profile and antioxidant properties.

The increasing demand for functional foods has boosted up the food industry to produce fiber-enriched products. In this study, dietary fiber (DF) was isolated from Doum fruit by exploiting the combination of microwave reactor technique and superfine grinding technology. The isolated Doum dietary fiber (DDF) possessed a high content of total dietary fiber, essential minerals and total polyphenols with good antioxidant activity. Biscuits were prepared by substituting wheat flour with DDF at different levels (0, 2.5, 5, 7.5 and 10%) and assessed for dough mixing properties and biscuit quality. The results showed that an increase of DDF in the flour affected physical parameters of biscuits by increasing the biscuits hardness and reducing the diameter, thickness and spread ratio. Supplementation of biscuits with DDF improved the nutritional value in terms of DF contents and essential minerals. Improvement in total phenolic contents (TPC) and antioxidant activities of the biscuits were also noted as a result of DDF supplementation. Biscuits supplemented with 7.5% DDF showed overall better sensorial characteristics. Conclusively, this study has shown that supplementation of wheat flour with DDF improved nutritional profile, antioxidant properties and overall consumer acceptability of biscuits. The present findings will be helpful regarding the development of functional foods enriched with DDF.

Protective Effects of Lepidium meyenii (Maca) Aqueous Extract and Lycopene on Testosterone Propionate-Induced Prostatic Hyperplasia in Mice.

The inhibitory effect of maca extractant, lycopene, and their combination was evaluated in benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) mice induced by testosterone propionate. Mice were divided into a saline group, solvent control group and testosterone propionate-induced BPH mice [BPH model group, solvent BPH model group, benzyl glucosinolate group (1.44 mg/kg), maca group (60 mg/kg), lycopene treated (15, 5, and 2.5 mg/kg), maca (30 mg/kg) combine lycopene treated (7.5, 2.5, and 1.25 mg/kg), and finasteride treated]. Benzyl glucosinolate was used in order to evaluate its pharmacological activity on BPH to find out whether it is the major active component of maca aqueous extract. Finasteride was used as positive control. The compounds were administered once for 30 successive days. Compared with solvent BPH model group, BPH mice fed with maca (30 mg/kg) and lycopene (7.5 mg/kg) combination exhibited significant reductions in the prostatic index, prostatic acid phospatase, estradiol, testosterone, and dihydrotestosterone levels in serum. They also had similar histological compared with those aspects observed in the mice in the solvent control group. The results indicated that combination of maca and lycopene synergistically inhibits BPH in mice. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Influence of doum (Hyphaene thebaica L.) flour addition on dough mixing properties, bread quality and antioxidant potential.

In this covenant of functional foods, the world seeks for new healthier food products with appropriate proportions of bioactive constituents such as fiber, mineral elements, phenols and flavonoids. The doum fruit has good nutritional and pharmaceutical properties; therefore, its incorporation in breads could be beneficial in improving human health. In the current study, partial substitution of wheat flour (WF) with doum fruit flour (DFF) at levels of 5 %, 10 %, 15 % and 20 % were carried out to investigate the dough viscoelastic properties, baking performance, proximate compositions and antioxidant properties of the breads. Partial substitution of WF with DFF increased the water absorption and developing time of dough (P ≤ 0.05), while, the dough extensibility, resistance to extension and the deformation energy were reduced. Bread supplemented with DFF resulted in a reduction in quality in terms of specific loaf volume, conferred softness, hardness, cohesiveness and gumminess to the bread crumbs. DFF up to 15 % could partially replace WF in bread; increase its nutritional value in terms of fiber content and minerals, with only a small depreciation in the bread quality. Sensory evaluation showed that breads supplemented up to 15 % DFF were acceptable to the panelists and there was no significant difference in terms of taste, texture and overall acceptability compared to the control. The incorporation of DFF increased the total phenolic contents, total flavonoids contents and antioxidant properties compared to the control (for both flour and bread).

Direct UV determination of Amadori compounds using ligand-exchange and sweeping capillary electrophoresis.

The detection of Amadori compounds poorly absorbing in the UV region is challenging. To cope with this problem, a simple and effective method using ligand-exchange and sweeping capillary electrophoresis was first developed. With this method, Amadori compounds can be detected by UV at 236 nm without derivatization steps and separated based on the stable levels of Amadori compound-Cu(2+) complexes. Under optimal conditions with background electrolyte of 50 mmol/L copper sulfate, pH 3.94, and separation voltage 25 kV, baseline separations of the following five Amadori compounds, N-(1-deoxy-D-fructos-1-yl) valine (Fru-Val), N-(1-deoxy-D-fructos-1-yl) leucine (Fru-Leu), N-(1-deoxy-D-fructos-1-yl) alanine (Fru-Ala), N-(1-deoxy-D-fructos-1-yl) methionine (Fru-Met), N-(1-deoxy-D-fructos-1-yl) glutamic acid (Fru-Glu), were achieved within a 20 min run. The method was applied to analyze these Amadori compounds in two tomato products. Fru-Glu could be quantitated sensitively down to 0.706 mg/L in MS powder (a kind of tomato powder), 0.726 mg/L in MS liquid (a kind of concentrated tomato juice), and the limit of quantification for the others ranged from 0.792 to 1.084 mg/L. The most abundant Amadori compound was Fru-Glu (1057.5 mg/100 g) in MS powder; however, Fru-Met was rarely detected in MS liquid. The accuracy of the method was tested by recovery measurement of the spiked samples, which yielded good results (94.2-106.0%) with relative standard deviation lower than 5%. Simultaneously, the method was also applied in the analysis of Fru-Glu content during a tomato puree evaporating concentration process. The first significant increase in Fru-Glu content coincided with the increment rate of soluble solids, which indicated that fast evaporation of water could be a critical step for the formation of Amadori compounds. These results show that this method is convenient and reliable for rapid analysis of Amadori compounds in tomato products.