Physicochemical and Rheological Evaluation of Cassava Flower Honey Produced by Africanized <i>Apis mellifera</i>

Abstract

Analyses of honey produced by AfricanizedKeywords: Apis mellifera, honey, chemistry parameters, rheology IntroductionIn Brazil, beekeeping is attracting interest of many farmers and several institutions, as it is an activity in which one can achieve good economic results (Welke et al., 2008). To guarantee a product with quality on the market that is increasingly demanding, it is important to know the characteristics of honey. Thus, it is necessary to carry out the physical-chemical and rheological analysis, aiming to standardize the product, thereby obtaining subsidies to ensure the quality of honey by detecting its possible adulterations. Honey may undergo several changes of various causes. Some occur because of farmers' lack of information related to the extraction technology, the proper management, the equipment to be used and mainly for storage and conservation of the product (Melo et al., 2003).Honey is a food product produced by honey bees from the nectar of flowers or secretions coming from live parts of plants or secretions of plant-sucking insects that lay on living parts of plants which bees collect, transform, combine with their specific substances, store and let ripen in the hive combs (Mercosul, 1999; Brazil, 2000; Codex Alimentarius, 2001). Honey has a complex system which contains sugars, organic acids, minerals, vitamins and phenolic compounds (Zalibera et al., 2008;Adetuyi et al., 2009;Babarinde et al., 2011). According to Hernández et al. (2005) honey has a very low mineral content (0.1 _ 0.2% for floral honey), which varies widely depending on the botanical origin, edaphoclimatic conditions and technical extraction.The viscosity is one of the most significant physical and sensory characteristics of honey, which affects the quality of theproduct (Yanniotis et al., 2006). Industrially, higher viscosities imply greater costs in centrifugation, decanting and mixing, caused The pH determination was performed using a digital pH meter. Materials and Methods Honey samples Honey was collected from hives ofThe ash samples were obtained by calcination in muffle furnace, according to Almeida-Muradian and Bera (2008). Determinations of reducing sugars, total and apparent sucrose were performed by using the Lane-Eynon method from a stock solution of 20% (IAL, 2005). The content of insoluble solids was determined according to Almeida-Muradian and Bera (2008). The diastatic activity was performed according to Marchini et al. (2004), where the buffered solution of starch-honey is kept in a water bath (40℃, the time required for obtaining the specific end point (absorbance lower than 0.235) determined spectrophotometrically. The results were obtained on a Gothe scale.Phenolic compounds were determined by Folin-Ciocauteau according to Meda et al. (2005) using gallic acid as standard. The determination of the honey color is based on different degrees of light absorption at wavelengths of 560 nm, using the pure glycerin as white and to classify the color of honey, it was used Pfund scale (Marchini et al., 2004)...

Physicochemical Properties of Enzymatically Modified Starches

“…The ∆H decreased due to annealing as well as GSET treatment, which supports the hydrolysis idea of the crystalline region and the helical structures in the granule by the enzyme. A decrease in ∆H was reported in the literature after annealing, which was attributed to weaker interaction between amylose and amylopectin during annealing [33]. Therefore, the present results suggest the simultaneous hydrolysis of both amorphous and crystalline structures of the starch granules.…”

“…The remaining starches exhibited an increase around 6% due to annealing and an average of 9% due to GSET. The increase in T p of the native starch was much less than T o , which points to the hydrolysis of the amorphous structure by the enzyme, since the amorphous regions facilitate for the melting of the crystalline region structure [33]. In addition, the increase in T p indicates a high structural organization of the granule due to annealing.…”