Optimising Soymilk Protein Nutriture through Selection of Appropriate Processing Technique

Abstract

A significant contributor to compromised nutriture of a particular nutrient is the method of processing or preparation. The pre-treatment technique employed in the processing of soybean milk is a wellrecognized factor that not only aids in the deactivation of certain anti-nutritional components but also enhances its protein digestibility and bioavailability. Second to the overall importance of soybean is the protein composition, which is a function of the monomeric amino acid it contains. Thus, the amino acid profile of soybean milk processed by three pretreatment methods including soaking, roasting and boiling was analyzed using amino acid analyzer (model 120A PTH; Applied Biosystems, Thermo Fisher Scientific, USA). The results show that pretreatment by boiling retained the best product judged in terms of general nutritional quality as shown by higher total amino acid content recorded as 97.95g/100g compared to those of toasted and soaking which were 88.36 g/100g and 91.28 g/100g respectively. Also boiling technique recorded the highest total essential amino acid content of 51.01g/100g as against 46.58g/100g and45.85g/100g for toasting and soaking methods employed. In the same vein, boiling technique gave the highest amount of total conditional amino acids, which was 46.37g/100g when compared to that of toasting at 43.18g/100g) and soaking at 42.26g/100g, making it ideal for therapeutic purposes. This findings show that soymilk produced through boiling pretreatment is recommended for consumption at both household and commercial levels in order to optimize the full benefit of soymilk nutrition and therapeutics.