Phytonutrient-rich guava date fruit confection: formulation, quality analysis and shelf-life studies

Dates are naturally occurring sweetener that are rich in phytonutrients which could be used as a substitute to refined white sugars in manufacturing of functional foods. Fruit toffees contain refined sugars which could be harmful to human wellbeing. This study aimed to formulate a functional mixed fruit toffee by replacing refined sugars with date paste (0 to 100% levels) in conventional fruit toffee consisting guava as base material. Increasing the date paste concentration (0 to 100%), led to a noticeable (p < 0.05) drop in hardness (20.60 to 12.29 N) while an increase in moisture content (10.00 to 14.64%) and water activity (0.65 to 0.77) was observed. Compared to control (100% refined sugar), date paste addition increased crude fiber and protein content by 58.4 and 281.4% with higher macro (88.25 to 329.44 mg/100 g potassium, 79.60 to 91.83 mg/100 g calcium, 18.81 to 50.49 mg/100 g phosphorus) and micro (4.23 to 8.55 mg/100 g iron and 3.00 to 4.25 mg/100 g zinc) minerals, phytochemical constituents (96.67 to 132.90 mg GAE/ 100 g phenolics, 71.18 to 103.28 mg QE/100 g flavonoids and 124.74 to 197.41 µg/100 g carotenoids) and antioxidant activity (37.69 to 50.67%). Based on sensory characteristics, toffees prepared by replacing sugar with 50% date paste were selected for storage studies and were found to be shelf stable for 3 months with satisfactory microbial and organoleptic quality. The study concluded that date paste may be used as a more nutritive alternative to refined sugar for development of phytonutrients rich sweet meal.