Nutrient and Sensory Evaluation of Cowpea -Acha Flour Blend in Pudding Production

Cowpea is an important food crop that is widely consumed as a protein and energy source despite its limitation and high cost when compared to other grains, with the use of acha gaining popularity. The present study was conducted to highlight the diverse potential and domestic applications of acha as well as its nutritional value. The nutritive properties of the cowpea-acha composite flour blends were investigated as well as the proximate and sensory properties of pudding (moin-moin) developed from the blends. Cowpea (100%) was used as the control and substituted with acha at different ratio from 10-50%. The flour blends were analyzed for, functional, chemical composition and pasting properties, while proximate composition and sensory evaluation was done on the products. The functional properties showed that bulk density, oil and water absorption, solubility and swelling power increased with substitution of acha and ranged from 0.74-0.80g/mL, 1.20-1.29%, 1.13-1.45%, 20.92-30.14% and 7.03-9.89% respectively, while dispersibility decreased from 76.00-74.50%. Chemical analysis of cowpea-acha composite flour blends showed that there were no significant (p˃0.05) differences in moisture, fat, fiber and carbohydrate contents, while ash, protein, starch, sugar, amylose and amylopectin showed significant (p˂0.05) difference. The pasting characteristics of cowpea-acha blends showed that peak and breakdown viscosities reduced as the level of acha substitution increased, while trough, final and setback viscosities increased with an increase in the level of acha substitution with all pasting parameters showing no significant (p˃0.05) difference. The sensory evaluation result indicated an organoleptically acceptable pudding from different blends of cowpea and acha with the 100% cowpea (control) as the most preferred.