Formulation and Evaluation of Cookies Containing Germinated Pigeon Pea, Fermented Sorghum and Cocoyam Flour Blends using Mixture Response Surface Methodology

Cookies were produced from blends of germinated pigeon pea, fermented sorghum and cocoyam flours. The study was carried out to evaluate the effects of varying the proportions of these components on the sensory and protein quality of the cookies. The sensory attributes studied were colour, taste, texture, crispiness and general acceptability while the protein quality indices were Biological Value (BV) and Net Protein Utilization (NPU). Mixture response surface methodology was used to model the sensory and protein quality with single, binary and ternary combinations of germinated pigeon pea, fermented sorghum and cocoyam flours. The sum of the component proportions was always equal to 100%. Results showed that BV and NPU of most of the cookies were above minimum recommended levels. With the exception of cookies containing high levels of pigeon pea flour, cookies had acceptable sensory scores. Increase in pigeon pea flour resulted in increase in the BV and NPU. Regression equations suggested that the ternary blends produced the highest increase in all the sensory attributes (with the exception of colour).