Potential of sprouted bean flour as a new ingredient for the formulation of bakery products

Legumes, due to their good climate resilience and well-balanced nutritional profile, are widely grown and used worldwide as human food. Legumes contain many bioactive compounds that have a positive role in preventing a broad range of diseases. However, legumes also contain anti-nutritional factors such as protease inhibitors, phytates, and some low digestibility di/oligosaccharides, that impair their extensive consumption in staple food. Various biotechnological processes have been tested as for overcoming one or more of the limitations mentioned above. In several grains and legumes, sprouting was used to improve the macromolecular profile, decrease the levels of anti-nutritional factors and/or generate/release bioactives. Among legumes, cowpea (Vigna unguiculata) is a versatile and sustainable crop, and represents a good candidate for developing novel processes and products. This study aims to investigate the impact of short time sprouting (48 and 72 hours) on cowpea seeds. Short sprouting modified the protein pattern, with an improvement in properties required for formation of a protein network. Sprouting also led to a decrease of anti-nutritional factors and of species able to sequester micronutrients, while improving phenolic content with possible antioxidant activity. These results indicate that sprouted cowpea flour may represent a food ingredient with added nutritional and technological value. This hypothesis is being tested through the ongoing characterization of wheat bread containing 25% of sprouted cowpea flour. Acknowledgment: This investigation is partially supported by National Recovery and Resilience Plan (NRRP), Mission 4 Component 2 Investment 1.3 - Call for tender No. 341 of 15/03/2022 of Italian Ministry of University and Research funded by the European Union – NextGenerationEU, in the frame of the project: Research and innovation network on food and nutrition Sustainability, Safety and Security (ONFoods).