Reduction of aflatoxin content of infected cowpea seeds during processing into food.

Abstract

Cowpeas have been a major source of protein, especially in developing nations. Despite of the fact that aflatoxin contaminations have been found to be mainly common in substrates such as carbohydrates, detection of the toxins in raw cowpeas has also been reported [7]. It is therefore important and necessary to investigate fate of the aflatoxin when raw cowpeas are processed into various products. In Nigeria, cowpea seeds are usually consumed after boiling to softness and mixed with ingredients such as pepper, salt and palm-oil to form a porridge. Other processing methods involve wet milling the cowpea seeds and either steaming in aluminium cups or in leaves to form 'moinmoin', or frying in oil to form 'akara' balls. In this work therefore, the fate of the aflatoxins as a result of the processing of artificially contaminated cowpeas was investigated.