Development of Locust Bean Fermentation Bin

Abstract

Locust bean is an important food condiment in Africa; it is rich in protein, carbohydrates, fat, and oil. Fermentation of the cooked bean (which is carried out traditionally) is one of the major and the last operation in the processing of the seed to obtain the condiment. A fermentation bin for fermenting locust beans was designed, fabricated, and evaluated in this study. The fermentation bin simulated the principle of the traditional fermentation operation by enhancing the conditions necessary for the complete fermentation of locust beans. The bin consists of an inner chamber (made of stainless steel) where fermentation takes place, the lagging material (made of fibreglass) to prevent heat loss in the closed system, and the outer chamber (made of metal sheet) which serves as housing for the bin. The bin was evaluated based on locust bean loading (2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12, 14, and 16 kg) and the time (48 hours), which was kept constant throughout the experiment. The results showed that an increase in the mass of locust beans in the fermentation bin led to a reduction in the overall rating of the output. For the above-listed loading of locust bean, the efficiency of the fermentation bin was 80%, 80%, 70%, 70%, 60%, 60%, 30%, and 20%, respectively. This result provides an insight into how to improve the efficiency of the device.

Keywords

• ocust bean
• sensory analysis
• fermentation operation
• fermentation bin

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