The Effect of Cooking and Fermentation on the Functional and Nutritional Properties of Walnut and Maize

Abstract

Abstract:Walnuts locally called 'asala'or 'awusa' are eaten after boiling and maize which is fermented in the production of gruels called 'ogi' a widely utilized complementary food, shows qualitative and quantitative deficiency in protein content. The objective of this work is to co-ferment raw maize and walnut and also cooked walnut and maize to get low cost infant complementary foods of improved nutritional quality which might address malnutrition in infants. The mixture was prepared by co-fermenting 300g cooked walnut with 700g raw maize w/w (CWM) for 72h at 30 O C. After 72h each product was wet-milled, sieved and dried at 60 o C. Resultant flour was analyzed for: Proximate composition, minerals, anti-nutrients, amino acids, fatty acids, phospholipids, sterols contents and consistency using standard methods. The pH of (RW/M) dropped more drastically from 6 to 5 at 12h to 72h than that of (CW/M). RW/M had higher values of ash (0.98), moisture (12.74), crude protein (10.72), crude fiber (4.63), ether extract (2.53), CHO (68.4) and energy (2824) than CWM. Cooking reduced the proximate composition. RWM was more enhanced in most amino acids, minerals, mystric, stearic, and linoleic acids. CW/M had more reduced values of oxalate, saponin, alkaloid, flavanoid and higher phytate. Phytin than RW/M. The values of total phenol in both samples were comparable. RW/M could serve as infant complementary food of improved nutritional quality. Bacillus pumilus, Lactobacillus delbrueckii, Leuconostocmesenteroide and Saccharomyces cerevisiaewere isolated from the fermented foods.