Effect of some traditional processing operations on the functional properties of African breadfruit seed (Treculia africana) flour

The effect of germination, fermentation, roasting and defatting on the proximate composition, water absorption capacity (WAC), oil absorption capacity (OAC), foaming capacity (FC), foaming stability (FS), emulsion capacity (EC), emulsion stability (ES), packed bulk density (PBD), least gelation concentration (LGC) and protein solubility (PS) of breadfruit seed flour (BSF) was investigated. WAC, OAC, FC, EC, PBD and LGC obtained are 190–380%; 130.3–200.5%; 2.3–60.4%; 12.4–52.9%; 0.4–0.6 g/ml; 6–12% (w/v) and 200–420%; 176.4–320.6; 4.2–70.8%; 20.2–60.4%; 0.5–0.7 g/ml; 0.5–0.8% (w/v) in the full fat and defatted flours respectively. Foams were more stable in the untreated; least in fermented and roasted samples. Defatting improved the FC, FS and EC; roasting and fermentation reduced EC of full fat BSF; Processing and defatting had no effect on the PBD; roasting and germination increased LGC while defatting and fermentation reduced it. Full fat flours had the lowest PS at pH 4 and the highest at pH 8. Fermented full fat BS flour had the highest PS at pH 5 and 8. Defatted germinated, raw dried and roasted BSF had lowest PS at pH 4; PS of fermented BSF is lowest at pH 3 and highest at pH 2.