ABSTRACT

Matured tubers from two cassava varieties NR8212 and Nwangbisi were fermented for 0 — 7 days respectively before processing into gari and fufti. Physcochemical analyses of the products were carricd out to determine the effect of fermentation on the quality of the processed products. Results showed that the Moisture content, p1-I, Titratable acidity and Cyanide values of the gari samples ranged from 9.7% to 10.0%; 4.0 to 7.2; 0.1% to 1.1%; and 2.omg/kgHCN to 39.0ng/kgl-lCN respectively while that of the full, samples ranged between 6.81% to 7.10%; 4.03 to 6.37; 0.15% to 0.56% and 2.00mg/kg l-lCN to 36.67mg/kg l-lCN. It could be noted from this experiment that fermenting the cassava for 3 days and frying for 30 minutes optimally reduced the cyanide content of the garri samples to 18.33mg/kgHCN for Nwangbisi and I 9.75mg/kgl-ICN for NR8212 while fermenting the cassava for 2 days also optimally reduced the cyanide in fufu to I 8.27mg/kgl ICN for Nwangbisi and I 9.06mg/kgl-ICN for NR8212. These values fall within the 20.00mg/kgl-ICN recognized by standard organization of Nigeria as safe level. The kinetics of the degradation of the cassava cyanide also showed that the fermentation of the two varieties of cassava followed the fj,st order Kinetic model. Thus a 1% increase in fermentation time (day) brings about 0.0696 decrease in HCN for the local variety (Nwangbisi) whereas a 1% increase iii fermentation time (day) brings about 0.098 decrease in J-ICN for the improved variety (NR8212).