摘要：Changes in consumer demand for new pastries due to the high rate of diabetes, obesity and celiac disease are causing an unprecedented spur in the processing and ingredient system developments within the pastry production sector. Consumers demand healthier pastries that are low in sugar, fat, cholesterol, and calories in general and contain in addition health-promoting compon ents such as protein, unsaturated fatty acids, and fibres. This project reports the proximate, mineral, functional and sensory characteristics of cakes produced from blends of wheat and cowpea flour using date as a sweetener. Six cake samples were produced with different formulations which include wheat flour and sugar (WHS), wheat flour and date fruit extracts (WHD), composite flour of wheat and cowpea in the ratio 50:50 with sugar (COS) and dates respectively (COD) and cowpea flour with sugar (CWS) and date fruit extracts (CWD) respectively. The protein content of the wheat, cowpea and composite flours ranged from 14.20-15.37%, moisture; 4.76-5.58%, ash; 0.52-0.53, crude fat; 0.99-1.53%, crude fibre; 0.20-0.23% and carbohydrate; 77.42 -78.45%. The loose bulk density, packed bulk density, water absorption capacity and oil absorption capacity had a range of 0.45 - 0.50g/mL, 0.68-0.73g/mL, 0.76-2.06g water/g flour and 0.70-1.20g oil/ g flour respectively. The proximate composition of the cakes varied significantly with cake produced from cowpea sweetened with sugar having the highest protein content and cake from wheat flour sweetened with date having the lowest. Generally, cakes produced from composite flour sweetened with sugar had higher contents of calcium than cakes sweetened with dates while the iron and potassium contents were higher in cakes sweetened with date extract. Cakes produced with sugar as the sweetener had better ratings than those with date fruit, however, all the cakes compared favourably well with the control (cake produced from 100% wheat flour sweetened with sugar) in all the parameters measured.
