Processing Of Eioboyrya.japonica L. Flower Tea And Nutritional Components

Loquat flower is the flower of Eriobotrya japonica which belongs to Rosaseae category.According to the historial book Ben Cao Gang Mu, loquat flower is a widely used Chinesemedicine. There are many reports of loquat flower about its chemical components and biologyactivities. However, the reports of different stages loquat flower are scared, especially, loquatflower tea in different processing. Therefore, the dissertation preliminary study aims todeveloping and utilizing loquat flower.To reveal the change regularity of nutritive materials contents and antioxidant activity infour different stages of loquat flowers (the bud stage, the bud swelling and come out whitepetals, the petals beginning spread and the petals opened).In the test, from the bud stages to the petals opened of loquat flowers, antioxidantmaterials contents and antioxidant activity exhibited an initial increase and a final decrease.Comparing other three stages, in the stage of the bud swelling and come out white petals,flavonoids, and the total phenolics were the most, respectively13.39±0.45mg/g,76.06±1.18mg/g; the same tendency, scavenging ability of·OH free radical, reducing power,total antioxidant capacity and scavenging ability of DPPH free radical are the best.Volatile compounds in four different stages of loquat flowers were analysed85,90,68and74kinds of volatile compounds were identified from the four different stages of loquatflowers, respectively, and accounted for93.97%,97.74%,92.5%and93.38%of the totalvolatile compounds. Ketones, acids, esters, aldehydes, alkanes, alcohols and a few othercompounds existed in the volatile compounds. From the bud stages to the petals opened ofloquat flowers, the content of the esters and acids showed gradually increase, the content ofaldehydes revealed a rapid decrease, and the content of akanes and ketones exhibited an initialincrease and a final decrease.From the bud stages to the petals opened of loquat flowers, the total content of aminoacids exhibited a decrease, its total content in the bud stages is7.91%, the bud swelling ofloquat flower is6.74%, the petals opened of loquat flowers5.74%.The loquat flower contains17kinds of amino acids which the body needs. The content of aspartic acid (1.19%) and proline (1.18%) is higher, while the content of methionine is lower. The mineral elements inloquat flower are very rich. Among the seven elements, the K elements is the highest, whichis in the petals beginning spread of the content is higher than the other three stages, followedby the content of Ca, Mn, Zn, the lowest is Cu, Mg. These results show the bud swelling ofloquat flower can be the best period for picking, development and utilization.The effects of three fixing methods, pan parch fixing microwave fixing, steam fixing onexternal and internal qualities of loquat flower were studied. The petals beginning spread ofloquat flower as raw materials developed flower tea in above three fixing methods. Byprocess optimization, the best temperature of pan parching is90℃, drying temperature80℃;microwave fixing can use the middle fire, and we can spend30s steam fixing loquat flowerto get the best flower tea.While different fixation had different influence in loquat flower, and the quality offlower tea is different. The results showed that steam fixing exhibited high efficiency, thecontent of flavonoids and total phenol is the most, and scavenging ability of·OH free radical,reducing power, total antioxidant capacity is higher than the other two fixing.loquat flower tea in pan parching fixing were identified106kinds of compounds andaccounting for94.71%of the total volatile components, which the content of aldehydes is thehighest; the loquat flower by microwave fixing were isolated107kinds of compounds, therelative content is97.18%, the content from high to low is hydrocarbon, aldehydes, ketones.The volatile components of steam fixing flower tea were extracted119kinds,95.8%,containing aldehydes, ketones and esters. Among three ways, loquat flower tea in steamfixing contains rich volatile components, which is a better fixing way.Loquat flower has abundant mineral element, loquat flower tea in different fixing waysdid not change significantly.