Flacourtia jangomas, locally known as Seriales is an indigenous fruit tree in the Philippines. It potentially contains important nutrients and bioactive compounds, but it is a less known commodity, with no economic value. Moreover, the fruit is highly prone to… More

Flacourtia jangomas, locally known as Seriales is an indigenous fruit tree in the Philippines. It potentially contains important nutrients and bioactive compounds, but it is a less known commodity, with no economic value. Moreover, the fruit is highly prone to enzymatic browning reaction, resulting to undesirable discoloration once exposed to air. Hence, this study was conducted to determine the changes in the physico-chemical properties of ripe Seriales fruit as affected by boiling time and storage conditions. Ripe Seriales fruits of known weight were exposed to upto 10 minutes of boiling water. Representative samples from each treatment were analysed of its color, total soluble solids, pH, and % titratable acidity. The same procedures were done to samples that had been stored for 19 days in the freezer. The results of the experiment revealed that storage conditions (frozen and not frozen) only affected the b* of the skin of the ripe Seriales fruits, while boiling time affected all other parameters, excepts pH, %TTA, and b* values of the fruit flesh. Less

Paragis is a common grass which is abundant and can be seen everywhere but is regarded as having no economic value. To add value to this grass, the study generally aimed to formulate cookies with powdered paragis leaves and mashed… More

Paragis is a common grass which is abundant and can be seen everywhere but is regarded as having no economic value. To add value to this grass, the study generally aimed to formulate cookies with powdered paragis leaves and mashed bananas; and specifically, it aimed to evaluate the sensory quality of the product. A 3 x 3 factorial design was used, with three levels for both powdered paragis leaves (0, 5, 10 % w/w) and mashed bananas (0, 15, 20 % w/w). Sensory evaluation was done to determine the product’s acceptability in terms of color, taste, aroma, texture, and flavor using a sensory panel. Acceptability ratings were subjected to response surface regression analysis using STATISTICA software. Results revealed that the combination of powdered paragis leaves and mashed bananas showed a significant effect on the color, aroma, texture, taste, flavor, and general acceptability of the product. The optimum combination was 8.8 % and 1.3 to 1.8% of mashed bananas and powdered paragis leaves, respectively, based on the volume of flour. It can be concluded that paragis leaves could be utilized in cookie production, providing potential value to this unwanted commodity using the optimum combination. Less

Seriales fruit is an underutilized wild fruit in the Philippines with promising food production potential, however the usual drawback of processing is the change in the composition or properties of the crop or product. Hence, the study aimed to determine… More

Seriales fruit is an underutilized wild fruit in the Philippines with promising food production potential, however the usual drawback of processing is the change in the composition or properties of the crop or product. Hence, the study aimed to determine and compare the proximate composition of raw and heattreated seriales fruits. Heat-treatment involves blanching, steaming, boiling and microwave-cooking, which were analyzed for its moisture content, ash content, crude fat, crude fiber and crude protein following standard methods. Results revealed that heat-treatment employed cause a significant difference (p<0.05) on proximate composition of the fruit except for ash and crude fat. High moisture content was identified to boiled and steamed fruits, and the lowest was observed in microwave-cooked seriales. Crude protein and fiber were revealed as having increased values in comparison with the raw seriales fruit. Less