Quality assessment of sweet snack from Garden cress (Lepidium sativum L.) seeds—An unexplored health grain.

Garden cress seed (Lepidium sativum L.), an unexplored health grain, is a rich source of nutrients,
nutraceuticals, and possess numerous health beneficial properties. Epidemiologically, it is known
to have galactagogue properties and is traditionally utilized as a functional food ingredient by the
lactating mothers. In present study, sweet snack was developed using garden cress seed to provide
this underutilized grain in a convenience ready-to-eat form. The product contained 11.8% protein,
20.9% fat (44.3% monounsaturated and 39.5% polyunsaturated fatty acids), 12.7% total dietary
fibers (67% soluble fiber), iron (3.9 mg/100 g), calcium (260.9 mg/100 g), and zinc (1.9 mg/100 g).
Moisture sorption studies exhibited a characteristic sigmoid curve which depicted 56% relative
humidity and corresponding equilibrium moisture content 5.7%, are critical to the product with
moisture tolerance of 2.2%. Sensory score revealed a shelf life of 4 months for the crunchy product
with an initial breaking strength of 97.8 N under ambient storage condition.
Practical applications
Today’s consumers are well aware of benefits of consuming a healthy diet, and hence, demand for
health-snacks is rapidly increasing. This necessitates the food industries to explore newer natural
plant source of functional ingredients. Garden cress (Gc) seeds are known to possess various
health benefits, especially as lactogenic properties due to the high content of nutrients, nutraceuticals,
and plant sterols. Hence, it is a potential source of desirable functional ingredient for the
development of health-snack. Therefore, in this study sensory acceptable, nutritious, and crunchy
ready-to-eat sweet snack using garden cress seeds was developed with adequate storage life,
which can serve as a vehicle to disseminate this unexplored health grain. The result of this study is
useful for production of healthy snacks from lesser known garden cress seed which is more suitable
for the lactating mother.