OPTIMIZATION OF THE FORMULATION FOR THE PRODUCTION OF ENRICHED BREAKFAST MEAL FROM WHOLE-WHEAT, ACHA AND ELM OYSTER MUSHROOM (Hypsizygus ulmarius) FLOUR BLENDS

The research optimized the formulation for the production of an enriched breakfast meal from blends of whole wheat, acha and Elm oyster mushroom flours. The wheat and acha grains procured from Shasha Market, Osogbo and Jos respectively were sorted, wet cleaned, dried, milled, sieved and packaged separately inside airtight plastic containers at room temperature. Elm oyster mushroom clusters purchased from LTC mushroom farm Osogbo were cleaned to remove extraneous materials, sliced, soaked in 0.5% salt solution for 5 minutes, drained, dried, milled, sieved and packaged into airtight containers. Sixteen runs of blends from three mixture components set at 0-100% wheat, 0-100% acha and 0-15% mushroom flours were designed using I-optimal mixture design of Design Expert 13 software package for the production of breakfast meal and the optimum formulation blend was confirmed by desirability plots. The blends were drum-dried at 150 °C, drum speed of 5 rpm and feed concentration of 30%. The optimum formulation was established using selected responses such as protein, fibre, peak viscosity (PV), water absorption capacity (WAC), swelling capacity (SWC), α-amylase and α-glucosidase inhibitory activities (AAIA and AGIA), 1, 1-diphenylpicrylhydrazine (DPPH) radical scavenging activity, total phenolic content (TPC), Carr index (CI), calcium and potassium contents of the samples. The results showed that the actual optimum blend was experimental run 3 of the mixture constituents: 65.63%, 23.13% and 11.25% correlated with the desirability plots of 67.9%, 22.4% and 9.8% for wheat, acha and mushroom, respectively. The increased addition of mushroom had significant effect (p≤0.05) on the protein, DPPH, TPC, AGIA and AAIA of the samples. The results of the predicted responses of the optimum blend were 17.75%, 1.04%, 7.53 mg/100g, 8.02 mg/100g, 626.75%, 483.58%, 42.97, 891.78 RVU, 0.46 mgGAE/mg, 54.74%, 31.36% and 48.07% for protein, fibre, calcium, potassium, SWC, WAC, CI, PV, TPC, DPPH, AGIA and AAIA, respectively. The model terms for protein, SWC, WAC, Carr index, TPC and AGIA were significant at p≤0.05. The study established the optimum blend formulation for the production of an enriched drum-dried breakfast meal.