Abstract
Cookies are popular, fast and convenient snacks generally consumed by people of all ages. This study was carried out to determine the effects of incorporating breadfruit flour as a recipe ingredient of cookies on physical, nutritional and sensory properties of the cookies. Good quality, mature breadfruits were washed, peeled and cut into slices of 1-mm thickness. The slices
were oven dried at 105°C for 3 hours. The dried chips were ground into flour and stored in an airtight container at 4°C. Different composite blends of wheat: breadfruit flour (100:0, 80:20, 60:40, 40:60, 20:80 and 0:100 percent ratios) were used as flour in recipe of preparing the cookies. The cookies made from different composite blends of flour were analysed for physical, nutritional and sensory qualities. The physical characteristics such as diameter, spread ratio, volume and breaking strength of the cookies decreased while the thickness increased, significantly (p<0.05) with increasing breadfruit flour from 0 to 100%. The moisture, ash, fibre, total carbohydrate, total phenolic content and antioxidant activity of the cookies increased while fat and protein content decreased with increasing breadfruit flour from 0 to 100%. According to Tukey’s test, the 40% breadfruit flour added cookies had the highest mean scores compared with other treatments and its overall acceptability which was not significantly different (p>0.05) from those made with 100% wheat flour. Therefore, cookies made with the blend wheat: breadfruit flour at 60:40 percent ratio were highly acceptable based on the physical, nutritional and sensory qualities. These cookies were rich in fibre, minerals, carbohydrates, total phenolic content, antioxidant activity and low in fat content compared with the ones produced using 100% wheat flour. The use of wheat-breadfruit composite flour in preparing cookies would be a value addition while it promotes the diversification of utilization of breadfruit in Sri Lanka and globally.
