Authors : O. Awogbemi and I.O. Ogunleye
Abstract: This research work investigated effects of quantity of salt and drying on the quality of 80 g sample of locust beans. Three categories of sample i.e., Non-salted, 5 g salted and 10 g salted, were analysed using the Direct Sunlight method of drying. After drying for 5 days, proximate and microbial analysis showed that the samples still retain most of their nutritional components and therefore fit for human consumption. Investigation also showed that salted sample is more nutritional than non salted sample as it contains 67.65% of protein as against 66.82% protein in the non-salted sample. After 5 days of drying, the non-salted sample had a microbial load of 1.02�107 cfu g 1as against the 1.42�105 cfu g 1 of the salted sample. The drying rate analysis also revealed that the non-salted sample has the fastest drying rate followed by 5 g-salted sample, with the 10 g salted sample having the least drying rate. At the end of the 3rd day of drying, the non-salted sample weighed 32 g; the 5 g sample weighed 36 g while, the10 g sample weighed 44 g.
O. Awogbemi and I.O. Ogunleye , 2008. Effects of Quantity of Salt and Drying on the Quality of Locust Beans. Journal of Engineering and Applied Sciences, 3: 261-265.