Jackfruit Seed Flour As Substitute For Cocoa Powder

Now scientists have given evidence that we can replace the chocolate aroma with jackfruit seed flour and almost equivalent nutrition. Demand from around the world to rise and surpass the production of cocoa beans as the main ingredient of chocolate-making.

More recently, a study published in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, suggests that a compound found in jackfruit seeds produce some of the same scent as cocoa beans processed. Jackfruit seeds potentially cheap marketed, can used as a substitute for use in the manufacture of chocolate.

Jackfruit Seed Flour

Globally, the world's farmers produce about 3.7 million tons of cocoa per year. Yields are not expect to increase significantly in the next few decades, but estimates suggest that demand for cocoa from around the world will grow to 4.5 million tons by 2020. To meet that demand, the scientists are investigating alternative sources that can mimic aroma and taste of chocolate. The jackfruit is a tropical fruit in South America, Asia, Africa and Australia.

In some countries such as Asia, processed jackfruit seeds usually boiled, steamed and baked before eaten. Jackfruit seeds believed to be a rich source of fiber, protein and minerals. But in contrast to those of Brazil, the country's largest cocoa producer in the US considered as waste jackfruit seeds. Based on this, scientists are seeking solutions to maximize the use of waste jackfruit seeds make it more useful. Where one of the compounds therein can used to produce chocolate aroma.

The researchers made 27 jackfruit seed flour with acidifying or fermented before drying. Then the flour baked or roasted several times, the same as the manufacturing process of making chocolate from cocoa powder. The team of scientists identified several compounds of flour jackfruit associated with the aroma of chocolate. They used gas chromatography-mass spectrometry, and found the compound 3-methylbutanal, 2.3-diethyl-5-methylprazine and 2-phenylethyl acetate.

The volunteers present in this study also asked to kiss jackfruit seed flour and explain the smell. The aroma different with pickled and fermented flour, it feels more like the aroma of fresh fruit such as caramel, hazelnut. The scientists concluded that processed jackfruit seeds capable of producing a chocolate aroma and considered as a potential replacement for the typical aroma of chocolate or cocoa powder.

Reference

• Jackfruit seeds could help ease looming cocoa bean shortage, 08 March 2017, by American Chemical Society.
• Optimization of Postharvest Conditions To Produce Chocolate Aroma from Jackfruit Seeds. Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, 2017; 65 (6): 1196 DOI: 10.1021/acs.jafc.6b04836