Production And Evaluation Of Fibre Biscuit From Flour Blends Of Wheat (Triticum Aestivum), African Breadfruit (Treculia Africana) And Coconut (Cocos Nucifera).

ABSTRACT

Composite biscuits were made by supplementing wheat flour with African breadfruit (ABF) and coconut flours after the African breadfruit was dehulled, cleaned and sorted, washed, ovendried, milled and sieved while the coconut meat was removed, grated, blended, dewatered, ovendried and milled. The flours were then used at various ratios of Wheat/ABF/Coconut 100:0:0, 90:5:5, 80:10:10, 70:15:15, 60:20:20, 50:25:25, 40:30:30. The 100% wheat biscuit served as the control. The functional properties of the flour blends, proximate composition, physical and sensory evaluation of the biscuit samples were evaluated. The biscuit samples had proximate composition ranging from 0.81 to 1.52% for moisture content, 2.01 to 4.64% for ash, 5.06 to 13.20% for crude fibre, 6.09 to 9.20% for protein, 5.63 tol3.50% fat, 61.46 to77.11% carbohydrate and 381.16 to 399.72% for caloric value. The functional properties ranged from 0.35 to 0.5lmlgl for bulk density, 1.42 to 3.43% for water absorption capacity, 1.50 to 2.01% for oil absorption capacity, 8.00 to 117.50 seconds for wettability, 1.03 to 1.35% for swelling index, 2.33 to 10.86% emulsification. Sensory result ranged from 4.24 to 7.28 for taste, 5.80 to 7.04 for appearance, 5.72 to 7.24 for texture, 5.28 to 7.00 for aroma and 5.32 to 7.68 for general acceptability while the physical analysis ranged from 0.72 to 0.76cm for height, 9.44 to 16.44g for weight, 3.26 to 3.36mm for diameter, 2.16 to 2.32 for spread ratio and 137.50 to 105.50g for breakstrength.