3.4. Color quality
The instrumental values for lightness (L*) and color (a*, b* value)
and computed hue angle (ho
) and chroma (C) values of the muffin's
crumb are given in Table 1. The L* values of muffin sample containing
10 g/100 g BMF in flour blend (71.98) were statistically
similar to that of control muffins (72.33). However, further increase
in the BMF level resulted in significant (P < 0.01) decrease inlightness that can be attributed to the dull cream color of BMF
(Veena et al., 2005) than commercial wheat flour. A higher fiber
content of BMF may also be responsible for the decrease in crumb
lightness which is similar to the findings on the flaxseed meal
based muffins (Shearer & Davies, 2005). The redness (a* value) also
increased significantly (P < 0.01) from 2.11 in control to 4.72 in
100 g/100 g BMF flour blend muffins. It was interesting to observe
that there was non-significant difference in redness of 80, 90 and
100 g/100 g BMF flour blend muffins. However, a decrease in
yellowness (b* value) from 30.56 in control muffins to 27.57 in
100 g/100 g BMF flour blend muffins was observed. The color of
the BMF may be responsible for these color changes. Increasing the
level of BMF also significantly affected the hue and chroma of the
muffins as evident from decreased values from 86.06 and 30.63 in
control muffins to 80.29 and 27.97 in 100 g/100 g BMF flour blend,
respectively. As far as the total color difference (DE*) is concerned,
RWF could be replaced in the flour blend for muffin formulation
with up to 20 g/100 g BMF without making any obvious color
difference in the human eye. However, these color changes did not
affect the mean sensory acceptability of BMF based muffins.