Spices: Flavor, Color, and Medicinal Properties
Spices can be defined as aromatic or acrid plant substances used to provide flavor, color and aroma to food (Mohamed, 2014). These spices are characterized by being rich in antioxidants and have some medicinal properties (Jeswal and Kumar, 2015; Kong et al., 2014). Spices are widely used throughout the world for many purposes, of which their used in food preparation and processing (Hashem and Alamri, 2010).
Many of them are used as traditional medicines in many cases such as infections, wounds, sprains and nausea and some spices help to improve glucose of plasma by improving insulin sensitivity (Mohamed, 2014). Because of its medicinal properties, spices are used for pharmaceutical industries as raw materials (Toma and Abdullah, 2013).In addition, essential oils of spices or spices themselves have preservative action (Nielsen and Rios, 2000).
Antimicrobial properties of some spices inhibit the fungal growth as reported for turmeric and sumac (Jeswal and Kumar, 2015; Toma and Abdullah, 2013), while essential oils and oleoresins of some spices shown to be high effectively against microbial growth. Essential oil of mustard is one of these oils, which includes the active component allyl isothiocyanate (AITC). Other spices such as cinnamon, garlic and clove considered as potential inhibitors (Nielsen and Rios, 2000). while other spices such as red chili and dry ginger considered as liable substance for growth of many fungi (Jeswal and Kumar, 2013).
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Although red chili is in the second rank as the largest used spice worldwide after black pepper, contamination of red chili samples by AFs and OTA were repeatedly reported by many studies and Aspergillus flavus, A. niger and A. fumigates are the fungi contaminants that are repeatedly detected in the flake or powder samples of red chili. In ginger derivatives and samples, the mycotoxins that have been detected are AFs and OTA. Contamination of spices can be occurred in the field, when the spices undergo drying process or during storage (Kabak and Dobson, 2017).
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Spices: Flavor, Color, and Medicinal Properties. (2018, Apr 25). Retrieved from https://phdessay.com/effects-and-side-effects-of-spices/
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