Potential of moringa (Moringa oleifera) leaf powder for functional food ingredients: A review

Abstract

One of the efforts to produce functional foods is using ingredients containing health-beneficial bioactive compounds. Another way to produce functional foods is fermentation generating bioactive compounds or fortification with the bioactive compound extract. An ingredient historically believed to have benefits on health is moringa (Moringa oleifera) leaf powder. Moringa leaf powder is a valuable source of functional ingredients, including protein, vitamins, minerals, and phytonutrients such as carotenoids, tocopherols, polyphenols, flavonoids, alkaloids, and tannins. However, moringa is a plant that is distributed in various tropical countries in the world. Its quality depends on geographical differences, cultivars, environmental conditions, seasons, genotypes, and varieties. This article reviews the bioactive compounds of moringa leaf powder and the characteristics of moringa leaf powder extract. The effect of moringa leaf powder fortification on food product characteristics is also discussed. Moringa leaf powder possesses many pharmacological properties, such as anticancer, anti-inflammatory, hepatoprotective, cardioprotective, and antioxidant ones. The bioactivity of leaf extract is extracting solvent dependent. Therefore, fortification results in nutritional improvement and increasing health benefits of food products. However, the adverse effect is found in sensory. Thus properties, thus the moringa leaf powder fortification level usually is less than 10%. Changes in the functional properties of foods due to moringa leaf powder fortification have been studied to a limited extent. A low level of fortification might not affect the properties of food products. Therefore, moringa leaf powder is potentially used as a functional food ingredient. Some studies reported the toxicological effects of moringa leaf powder and the use of this ingredient, should be below the harmful doses.

Moringa oleifera (Moringaceae) an in-depth review of its nutritional classification and therapeutic application

“…Nine amino acids, sucrose, D-glucose, traces of alkaloids, wax, quercetin, and kaempferat are all found in flowers. Ash is abundant in potassium and calcium (Ariani et al, 2023).…”

Utilization of local therapeutic food in preventing and treating nutrition problems in the dry land area of the islands of east nusa tenggara province

“…[ 2 ] Moringa leaves ( Moringan oleifera ) contain many nutrients and are always available in abundant quantities. [ 3 ] However, people still use it more as a hedge plant than consuming it. In fact, this type of vegetable can be used as an alternative food to overcome nutritional problems (malnutrition).…”

Sensory Evaluation of Gluten-Free Wet Noodles Made from Potato (Solanum tuberosum L.) Flour with the Addition of Kersen (Muntingia calabura L.) Leaves Powder

“…Glutenfree noodles made from potato flour contain more rapidly digestible starch, which helps to create a feeling of fullness and produces a low blood sugar response in consumers (Yang et al, 2023). Adding kersen leaves powder can enrich the nutritional content of gluten-free noodles (Ariani et al, 2023). However, research on gluten-free noodles made from potato flour with the addition of kersen leaves powder has never been done.…”