Jornal de Química Experimental de Alimentos

Technology and Biochemical Changes Associated with the Production of Zamne: A Traditional Food of Senegalia macrostachya Seeds from Western Africa

Abstract

Aimée WDB Guissou, Charles Parkouda, Souleymane Ganaba and Aly Savadogo

Technology and nutritional composition of zamne a traditional food of Senegalia macrostachya seeds from western Africa were studied in different production sites with the aim to establish the flow diagrams and evaluate the effect of the processing on its biochemical composition. Result showed a diversity of the processing methods according to the locality. The process included mainly successive cleaning of seeds, boiling for about 3-6 h, softening with alkalinizing ash leachate. The raw seeds were composed of 26.56 ± 1.24% of crude proteins, 40.08 ± 0.49% of crude lipids, 28.02 ± 0.05% of carbohydrates and 16.19 ± 0.16% of fibres on dry matter basis. For the ready to eat zamne, the moisture content varied from 79.54 ± 0.1 to 81.27 ± 0.2%, ash content from 4.95 ± 0.06 to 9.58 ± 0.13%; total carbohydrate varied from 17.04 ± 0.08 to 22.63 ± 0.12%, protein content from 45.46 ± 2.32% to 53.52 ± 1.23%, total fibre from 21.14 ± 0.11 to 22.67 ± 0.35% and lipid from 1.02 ± 0.02 to 1.55 ± 0.15%. The products were alkaline with pH ranging between 7.55 ± 0.01 and 8.38 ± 0.00 representing a titratable acidity varying from 0.08 ± 0.004 to 0.15 ± 0.01. Processing methods caused decreases of crude lipid (80%), total carbohydrates (60%) titratable acidity (45-84%) and an increase of fibres (30-40%), proteins (13-33%) and amino acids.