Antioxidant Capacity and Total Phenolic Content in Honey Brands from Mexican Market and Some Physicochemical Parameters Related

Pedro Mondragón Cortez

doi:10.11648/j.wjfst.20190302.11

Abstract

During the production of a honey brand, artisanal or fresh honey is usually heated and filtered with the purpose of to improve fluency and this way can to facilitate its packaging process. However, an overheated honey can change the original antioxidant capacity, mainly due to the damage that the phenolic compounds have in the honeys. For this reason, the purpose of this work was to determine the behavior of the antioxidant capacity and total phenolic content in twelve samples of honey brand available in the Mexican market. 2, 2-diphenyl-1-picryhydrazyl (DPPH) free radical scavenging activity and total phenolic content were measured. Moreover, moisture, hydroxymethylfurfural (HMF) content, color parameters (L*, a* and b*) and fructose and glucose content were also determined by the purpose to support the study of antioxidant capacity in the samples of honey brand studied. The results indicated that honey brands showed an antioxidant capacity in normal levels, in comparison to other types of honey from different countries, despite the fact that the total phenolic content values were relatively low. This behavior observed may be due to the fact that the formation of the compounds with high antioxidant capacity from Maillard reactions, mainly HMF, during the heat of the honeys, which contributed in an important way with the values of the antioxidant capacity observed.

Highlights

Honey is a sweet substance, which is composed mainly of fructose (38%), glucose (31%), other sugars (10%) and water (18%) [1]
The purpose of this work was to determine the antioxidant capacity and total phenolic content of twelve honey brands acquired in the supermarket (Guadalajara City, Mexico) and to correlate it with some physicochemical parameters that help to the interpretation, such as color determination (L*, a* and b*), fructose and glucose content, water content and HMF content
The results suggest that these honey brands were subjected to overheating during the packaging process

Summary

Introduction

Honey is a sweet substance, which is composed mainly of fructose (38%), glucose (31%), other sugars (10%) and water (18%) [1]. The components associated with the antioxidant capacity in honey are mainly phenolic compounds [7, 8]. These compounds are biologically active secondary metabolites from plants, which are transferred to honey by bees that collect nectar from flowers [9]. The antioxidant capacity in a honey depends on its floral origin, mainly. The processing of honey may have a negative effect on its antioxidant activity. It has been observed that the antioxidant activity in a honey increases during a prolonged heating due to the formation of compounds from Maillard reaction, mainly hydroxymethylfurfural [11, 12]

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