Traditional and Emerging Feedstocks for Food and Industrial Bioproduct Manufacturing - Food and Industrial Bioproducts and Bioprocessing - page 22

cooking oil. Oil was burned to provide light and used as soothing ointment and for soap
making. The hard shells of the kernel provided fuel for fire and leaves were utilized for
making roof thatching, fencing, mats or brooms. Ropes made from the leaf stalk fiber were
woven into baskets and fish traps. Sap from the immature flower stalks was used to prepare
soft drinks or fermented to make palm wine, vinegar and other alcoholic drinks (Henderson
and Osborne, 2000 ).
Today palm oil is widely used in food applications and preferred for frying and baking
applications because of its good oxidative stability and high solid fat content. Palm oil
contains about 50% saturated (42-48% palmitic and 4-5% stearic acids) and 50% unsaturated
fatty acids (37-41% linoleic and 9-11% linolenic acids). The fatty acid composition of palm
kernel oil resembles that of the coconut oil rather than that of palm oil. Palm kernel oil is
rich in lauric (about 48%), myristic (16%) and oleic (15%) acids. Both palm oil and palm
kernel oil are commercially separated into stearin (solid) and olein (liquid) fractions for
special applications. The stearin fraction obtained from palm kernel can be used as a cocoa
butter substitute. The olein fraction is used in baked goods and soap manufacturing. Imitation
palm-oil-based cheese, hand and body lotion, fatty acid methyl esters for use as fuel or
solvent, and epoxidized palm oil to produce plasticizers and stabilizers for conventional
polyvinyl chloride plastics are some of the other products that are produced from palm oil
(Basiron, 2005 ).
Kernel cake residue after palm kernel oil extraction is a good source of livestock feed.
The other palm fruit bunch residues fire the boilers to generate steam and electricity for the
processing plant. Trunks, fronds and kernel shells have even been used for the production of
furniture, building materials (panel board), pulp and paper. Oil palm fiber extracted from the
empty fruit bunches (43-65% cellulose and 13-25% hemicellulose) is being tested for
production of biocomposites (Shinoj et al ., 2011 ).

1.3.3.7 Ground nut

Ground nut ( Arachis hypogaea ), also known as peanut, earth nut, and monkey nut, is an
important food crop. The oil contents of four major United States market types of peanuts,
runner, Virginia, Valencia and Spanish, vary from 44 to 56%. Major fatty acids of peanut oil
are oleic (36-67%) and linoleic (15-46%) acids. In 1969 a peanut breeding line containing
about 80% oleic acid and 2% linoleic acid was identified (Norden et al ., 1969 ). The
incorporation of high oleic genes into new peanut breeding lines resulted in the SunOleic
cultivar, a high oleic variety released by the Florida Agricultural Experiment Station in 1995
(Gorbet and Knauft, 1997). The SunOleic peanut variety has a favorable high oleic acid
content and, consequently, extended shelf life (Jonnala et al ., 2005b ). Although they have not
been commercialized yet genetically modified peanut varieties have been developed (Chenault
et al ., 2005). No substantial difference was found when chemical composition of genetically
modified peanut varieties were compared to their parent cultivars (Jonnala et al ., 2005a , 2006b).
In 2003 the US FDA approved the first qualified health claim for a food for immediate
use on package labels. The claim states that “Scientific evidence suggests but does not prove
that eating 1.5 ounces per day of most nuts, as part of a diet low in saturated fat and
cholesterol, may reduce the risk of heart disease” (FDA, 2003a). Numerous studies have
shown that including nuts in the diet can reduce the risk of heart disease (Haumann, 1998;
Kris-Etherton et al ., 2001; Higgs, 2002). Peanuts are a good source of a wide range of
nutrients and bioactive compounds with health benefits. Many of the health beneficial
bioactive compounds present in nuts are associated with the oil fraction (Jonnala, 2004).