Abstract
This work deals with the digestibility of a selected species of edible insect - mealworm (larvae) as novel food in dependency on its culinary treatment. The aim of this work was to find suitable thermic culinary treatment of mealworm larvae considering its optimum digestibility by human. The digestibility of materials from whole insect and extracted nitrogenous substances was determined using three different culinary treatments - without culinary treatment (freshly killed), dried insect and roasted insect. The digestibility was determined by gravimetric in vitro method using pepsin and pancreatin enzymes and their combination. The total nitrogen content of the insect samples was determined by the Kjeldahl method. The digestibility of the whole homogenized larvae using the combination of pepsin and pancreatin enzymes, thus simulating human digestion in-vitro, ranged from 81% for roasted specimens to 91.5% for culinary unprocessed insect. Similarly, the digestibility of nitrogenous substances of homogenized insect samples using this combination of enzymes ranged from 24.2% for roasted specimens to 80.2% for culinary unprocessed samples. The work showed the dependence of the digestibility of the mealworm larvae on the culinary treatment - the increasing heat load of the sample reduced the digestibility. Furthermore, it proved the effect of the digestive enzyme on the digestibility of the insect sample.
Highlights
Digestion is a physiological process in which nutrients contained in food are decomposed into a resorbable form
This study focused on digestibility of edible insect, which assumes that digestibility is different for different culinary treatments of insect
The dried sample hydrolysed by the combination of pepsin and pancreatin enzymes has an average value just slightly below the level of the sample hydrolysed only by the pancreatin, and it seems that the above trend cannot be applied
Summary
Digestion is a physiological process in which nutrients contained in food are decomposed into a resorbable form. Nitrogenous substances, fats and carbohydrates have to be split up so that they can pass through the intestinal wall into the blood. The blood will transport them further to the necessary places in the organism where they are utilized (Mišurcová et al, 2010). Digestibility is most commonly determined as protein digestibility. This digestibility is influenced by the culinary treatment. Especially cooking and frying, improves sensory quality of food, and induces formation of flavours, attractive colours and textures. Cooking improves hygienic quality by inactivating some pathogenic microorganisms, improves digestibility and increases the bioavailability of certain nutrients in the gastrointestinal tract (Bognár, 1998)
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
