Cocoa beans (Theobroma cacao) are rich in phenolic compounds which show antioxidant properties. Roasting is one of the most important unit operations in the cocoa base industries which reduces the antioxidant activity. Cocoa beans were subjected to roast at 150, 200 and 250℃ for 10 − 50 min using conventional and superheated steam methods on changes in the total phenol content (TPC), total flavonoid content (TFC), free radical scavenging activity and antioxidant properties. The total phenols and total flavonoid were significantly (p < 0.05) higher using superheated steam than conventional roasting method. The cocoa beans treated by conventional method showed significantly (p < 0.05) lower the free radical scavenging activity and antioxidant properties than superheated steam roasting method.Keywords: cocoa bean, superheated steam roasting, conventional roasting, phenolic compound, antioxidant properties *To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: taris@usm.my
IntroductionThe phenolic compounds present in the food that can prevent or delay lipid oxidation through the inhibiting of oxidizing reactions in our body. It has been reported that food such as fruit, vegetable and seeds contain a significant amount of natural antioxidant components including phenolics (Mandic et al., 2008;Katalinic et al., 2004). Studies reported that there is a negative correlation found between dietary intake phenolics and coronary heart diseases, stroke and cancer (Sun et al., 2002).Cocoa beans are the seed from the fruit Theobroma cacao tree which is the essential ingredient of chocolate and chocolate base products. The cocoa beans are rich in phenolic and other antioxidant properties. Approximately 12 − 18% of phenolic compounds are reported in unfermented cocoa beans (dry weight). Almost 60% of the total phenolic compounds are procyanidin (oligomers), epicatechin and catechin (flavanol monomers) in raw cocoa beans (Dreosti, 2002). The study described that the cocoa beans contain higher amount of flavan-3-ol. The flavan-3-ol (catechin and epicatechin) are the main monomeric compound of polyphenol found in cocoa (Lamuela-Raventós et al., 2005). These compound have the highest bioavailability among cocoa phenolic compound because the absorption is depends on the molecular size. The monomeric compounds are biologically more active than oligomers and polymers and found in high concentration that can interact with the target compound easily especially free radicals (Cooper et al., 2009). These compounds have a potential contestant to inhibit or delay the oxidative damages in our body (Adamson et al., 1999). The studies revealed that these compounds are capability to reduce lipid peroxidation, inhibit peroxyl radicals and scavenge superoxide radicals and hydroxyl radicals (Salah et al., 1995;Vinson and Hontz, 1995;Kanner et al., 1994). Furthermore, the study demonstrated that the antihyperglycaemic effects on streptozotocin induced diabetic rats were found using the extracts prepared from cocoa (Ruzaidi et al., 2005). Antioxidant p...