Model and its validation
The effect of independent variables on the product responses has been reported in Table 1. According to the ANOVA table from RSM, it was found that the model was well fitted for all the process variables (Table 2) as the F value was significant (p<0.05), lack of fit was insignificant (p<0.05) and the CV values were less than 7%. The values of the coefficient of the determination (R
2) for all the models was in the range of 0.91-0.99 which proves the data accuracy. The Predicted R² was in reasonable agreement with the adjusted R² in which the difference was less than 0.2 among the both. Adequate Precision which measures the signal to noise ratio was found to be high in all the responses so, this model can be used to navigate the design space.
Product responses
Crude protein (CP)
The CP of doughnuts ranged from 7.86 to 9.55% (Table 1). According to the regression model it was found that blend ratio and curd showed significant effect on CP content (p<0.01) at linear level whereas at quadratic level blend ratio and butter showed significant effect at (p<0.01) and (p<0.05), respectively (Table 3). The linear effect of blend ratio showed that with the increase in the blend ratio, the CP decreased (Fig 1a) whereas the positive linear effect of curd showed that CP increased with the increase in the curd content (Fig 1b). This could be because of decrease in amount of quinoa flour from 1:1to 3:1 as the protein content of quinoa (16.89%) is more than that of finger millet (8.9%) (
Dhaka and Prasad, 2020) and curd is known as excellent source of protein and contains protein with high biological value
(Mckinley, 2005).
Crude fat (CF)
The CF content varied from 18.68 to 26.66% (Table 1). According to the regression model it was found that at linear level butter and curd content showed positive significant effect on CF content at (p<0.01) and (p<0.05), respectively (Table 3) whereas blend ratio showed non-significant effect. None of the parameters showed significant effect at both interactive and quadratic level. It was seen that CF increased highly with the increase in butter content (Fig 1c) and slightly increased with increase in curd content (Fig 1d). This is due to the fact that butter contains good amount of fat in which bakery fats (margarine and butter) contain about 80% fat (
Mamat and Hill, 2014) and curd contains about 3-4% fat (
Anonymous, 2017).
In vitro protein digestibility (IVPD)
IVPD varied from 66.67 to 79.47% (Table 1). According to the regression model it was found that at linear level butter and curd showed significant effect on IVPD (p<0.01) whereas blend ratio showed non-significant effect. At quadratic level all the three independent variables showed significant effect (p<0.05) (Table 3). It was found that with increase in butter from 12 to 20%, IVPD decreased (Fig 1e). This is because of binding ability of protein with fat (
Kinsella, 1982) leading to reduced bioavailability of protein. IVPD slightly decreased and then increased with increase in curd content (Fig 1f). This is because of presence of high biological value protein in curd (
Mckinley, 2005).
Springiness
Springiness refers to the height that the doughnut recovers after the end of first bite and the starting of the second bite. The obtained values varied from 0.250 to 0.415 mm (Table 1). According to the regression model it was found that at linear level only butter showed significant effect on springiness (p<0.01) whereas blend ratio and curd showed non-significant effect. At quadratic level, blend ratio and curd showed significant effect (p<0.01) (Table 3). It was observed that springiness decreased with increase in the butter from 12 to 20% (Fig 1g). This is due to the fact that more amount of butter makes the product easy to crumble and hence results in decreased springiness. Similarly
Srikanlaya et al., (2017) conducted a study which showed that when butter content was increased from 10 to 30 g/100 g flour, hardness of the bread was decreased and springiness increased.
Flavor
The score varied from 7.4 to 9 (Table 1). According to the regression model it was found that at linear level, blend ratio and butter showed significant effect on flavor (p<0.01) whereas none of the parameters showed significant effect at quadratic and interactive level (Table 3). Both the blend ratio and butter showed positive linear effect with flavor as shown in Fig 1(h) and Fig 1(i), respectively. This was due to the reason that flavor of FMF was liked more by the panelist as compared to flavor of quinoa and butter enhances the flavor of the other ingredients and also contributes its own flavor to the product (
Geetha and Narayanan, 2004).
Appearance
The score varied from 7.75 to 8.80 (Table 1). According to the regression model it was found that at linear level, blend ratio and butter showed significant effect on appearance (p<0.01), at interactive level butter and curd showed significant effect (p<0.05) and at quadratic level only blend ratio showed significant effect (p<0.01) (Table 3). The acceptance for appearance decreased with increase in blend ratio from 1:1 to 3:1 because of black colour of finger millet (Fig 1j) whereas increased with increase in butter from 12 to 20% (Fig 1k) due to the fact that bakery shortenings added to the product showed better surface characteristic (
Manohar and Rao, 2002). Interactive effect of butter and curd content has been shown in 3-D graph (Fig 1l). It is observed in the figure that at higher level of curd content if the butter content is increasing then the score for appearance of the doughnuts is also increasing.
Optimization and validation of variables
Process variables were optimized using the RSM software to obtain the most acceptable doughnut. The main standard for optimization was the CP, IVPD, springiness, flavor, appearance which were maximized and CF was minimized. According to the data analysis, the process variables that gave the desired qualities for doughnuts were blend ratio 3:1, butter 16.712% of CF and curd 25% of CF. Table 4 showing the predicted and observed values of process variables indicating their mean and standard deviation.
Quality evaluation and comparison of control RWF doughnuts and optimized FMF and QF incorporated doughnuts
The optimized FMF and QF incorporated eggless doughnuts as well as control RWF doughnuts were analyzed for different quality parameters such as nutritional, sensory and textural quality.
In terms of nutritional quality significantly higher values were observed for total ash (1.83%), crude protein (8.98%), crude fibre (3.11%) of optimized doughnuts in comparison with for total ash (1.67%), crude protein (4.81%), crude fibre (0.63%) of control RWF doughnuts as shown in Table 5. Similarly,
Kumar et al., (2018) reported higher crude protein content and lower total ash content in doughnuts prepared by 40% substitution of RWF with FMF in comparison to control RWF doughnuts. Similarly, calcium (114.67 mg/100 g) and iron (3.10 mg/100 g) were also found to be significantly higher in optimized doughnuts than calcium (29.33mg/100 g) and iron (1.59 mg/100 g) in control doughnuts as shown in Table 5. In contrast to this carbohydrate content (53.58%) and physiological fuel value (440 Kcal) of control doughnuts were found to be significantly higher when compared to carbohydrate content (42.49%) and physiological fuel value (397 Kcal) of optimized doughnuts.
In terms of textural quality hardness of optimized doughnuts (169.5 N) has been found to be significantly higher than that of control doughnuts (146.43 N) as shown in Table 5. It is because of presence of more dietary fibre content in optimized doughnuts because when the dietary fibre content increases the hardness of the product increases
(Li et al., 2020). Whereas, springiness of control doughnuts (0.331 mm) has been found to be significantly higher than that of optimized doughnuts (0.241 mm) as shown in Table 5. This is because of mixing of FMF with RWF results in reduction of gas retention capacity of dough which lowers the springiness of the product and also with increase in dietary fibre the elasticity of the product decreases
(Li et al., 2020). Sensory evaluation on the basis of Hedonic scale showed non-significant difference between control RWF doughnuts (7.95) and optimized doughnuts (8.20) as shown in Table 6. In contrast to this sensory evaluation conducted on pear millet blended doughnuts showed lowest score for sensory parameters when compared with refined wheat flour doughnuts
(Kaur et al., 2017).