EFFECT OF MORINGA (Moringa oleifera) LEAF POWDER INCORPORATED GREEN TEA (Camelia sinensis) ON PHYTOCHEMICAL, ANTIOXIDANT AND QUALITY ATTRIBUTES

Abstract

The present work was carried out to prepare moringa leaf incorporated green tea (blend) powder and evaluate its chemical, phytochemical, antioxidant activity and sensory analysis. Moringa leaves (Moringa oleifera) and green tea leaves (Camellia sinensis) were mixed in different proportions naming B, C, D, E and control A (8.75:91.25, 17.5:82.5, 26.25:73.75, 35:65, 0:100) to obtain an optimum formulation of a blended tea using Design Expert v 13.0.1.0 software. Green tea, moringa leaf and the blends were subjected to organic solvent of methanolic extraction to determine the major phytochemicals (phenol, flavonoid, tannin, chlorophyll, vitamin C and caffeine) content along with DPPH radical scavenging activity. The sensory analysis was carried out for color, aroma, taste, astringency and overall acceptance of five tea infusions using a 9-point hedonic scale rating test. Analysis of variance (ANOVA) was done and Tukey’s honesty test was performed by JMP version 14 to check the significant relationship between the mean values of the samples at p<0.05. From ANOVA, by the chemical and phytochemical analysis Sample E having 65% green tea and 35% moringa powder was obtained as most nutritious blend among four samples of mixture formulation from statistical analysis at P<0.05. The chemical analysis of the blend E found moisture 6.934%, protein 24.81%, fat 7.22%, fiber 7.78% and ash 6.39% were significantly different (P<0.05) than that of control green tea except for the crude fiber which is not significantly different from green tea. The methanolic extract of blend E had TPC 55.820±0.11 mg GAE/g, TFC 45.580±0.06 mg QE/g, TTC 30.500±0.060 mg GAE/g, chlorophyll 2.496±0.145 mg/g, caffeine 12.346±0.075 mg/g, vitamin C 52.72 mg/g and DPPH 68.746% inhibition and was significantly different (P<0.05) than that of control product green tea except for TTC which is not significantly different from the control. From the Sensory evaluation, product B achieved the highest mean sensory score and closely resembled the control sample which was conducted focusing on color, aroma, taste, astringency, and overall acceptability and were analyzed statistically using one-way ANOVA at a 5% level of significance.