Abstract
Background: Moringa oleifera leaves (M.O.L.) have medical and nutritional properties, which make these leaves appropriate for using to make various food products such as juices. Fruits and vegetables commonly consumed as a beverage and juice. Mostly, to have higher quality juice with fresh taste, the standard is often fresh juice not-processed, however, their shelf life is less than 6 or 7 days depends on the fruit and vegetable types. Thus, they have been preserved by several methods such as thermal process. Therefore, the aim of this study was to evaluate the treated fruit and vegetable juices mixed with fresh M.O.L extract (F.M.O.L.E.) to produce untraditional healthy products as well as prolonging the shelf life with negligible loss of bioactive components. Methods: in this study each fruit and vegetable were boiled in water, blended, filtrated and then mixed as follows: Treatment 1, F.M.O.L.E. 40% with Pineapple 38%+Carrot 20 %+Ginger 2%. Treatment 2, mixed F.M.O.L.E. 50% with Pineapple 38%+Carrot 10 %+Ginger 2%. Treatment 3, F.M.O.L.E. 60% with Pineapple 28%+Carrot 10%+Ginger 2%. Microbiological, Sensorial and physicochemical analysis were conducted on juices (packed in glass bottles) during storage at 4 +/- 1 degrees C. Results: Chemical analysis ascertained that F.M.O.L. is an exceptional source of ascorbic acid (139.46 mg/100g), Meanwhile, F.M.O.L.E. is a respectable source of phenolic compounds (38.76 mg GAE/mg) and antioxidant activity (77.65%), respectively. Results of sensory evaluation indicated that treatment (1) and (2) were acceptable between diverse panelists. Physicochemical analysis indicated that both treatment (3) and (2) have the lowest content of total acidity and highest contents of pH value, ascorbic acid (6.25 mg/100ml), total phenolic (73.21 and 66.41 mg GAE/ml) and antioxidant activity (76.33 and 72.10%), respectively at zero time and after one month of storage time. For now, these parameters were affected by storage time, the pH value, ascorbic acid, phenolic components and antioxidant activity were decreased during storage time of all treatments. Moreover, the color analysis of L*, a* and b* value displayed that all treatments were light (L* value) plus, tend to yellowness (+b* value) more than color redness (+a* value) at zero time. All values increased after one month of storage time. Microbiological analysis showed that there is a growth of yeasts after one month of storage time in all treatments. Although, treatment (2) was not exceeding the maximum count permitted of the Gulf Standard. Therefore, the cooking process of fruit and vegetables to produce juices, mixed with F.M.O.L.E by 50% treatment (2) preserve the juice during storage time up to one month compared to other treatments. From HPLC analysis of treatment (2), it appeared that Epicatechin (EP), chlorogenic acid (CH), 4-O-Caffeoylquinic acid (CA), rutin (RU), quercetin (QU) were predominant phenolic components in treatment (2). Whereas, the others are dominant phenolic constituents, benzoic acid (BE) and cinnamic acid (CI). Conclusion: from all the aforementioned obtained results of sensory evaluation and other analysis emerged a successful and appropriate ways to produce fruit and vegetable juices mixed with 40% or 50% of F.M.O.L.E.