Quinoa is a pseudo-cereal that belongs to the pre-Columbian indigenous food habits due to its good nutritional quality and its potential given by an easy development of the crop under different environmental conditions with simple technologies. Pasta replaced with quinoa can represent benefits for consumer health and nutrition, as it will have a better nutritional quality compared to the market pasta with 100% wheat semolina. The effect of pasta consumption with a higher degree of substitution (30%) with quinoa flour "Blanca Aurora Jerico" was explored to determine the potential benefits on cardiovascular risk markers in a healthy population. Anthropometric measurements, dietary assessment, lipid markers of oxidative stress, inflammation and thrombosis were evaluated in a selected healthy population of 10 individuals aged between 25 and 60 years recruited from endocrinology Military Hospital "Dr. Carlos Arvelo "in Caracas, Venezuela, in collaboration with the School of Nutrition and Dietetics at the Central University of Venezuela. Patients with chronic diseases such as diabetes, infections, autoimmune diseases, obesity and people with regular consumption of alcohol or psychoactive substances, pregnant and antiplatelet therapy and antioxidant were excluded. The effect of consumption of pasta in biochemical markers: total cholesterol, HDL and LDL cholesterol, triglycerides, glucose, uric acid, creatinine and insulin in metabolically healthy population were no statistically different for any of these markers before and after intake substituted quinoa pasta. According to these results, the ingestion of pasta does not influence the evaluated parameters and can be advised for special diet regime.

Copoazú is an Amazonia tropical fruit with outstanding sensory characteristics. Bromatological composition showed that the pulp has a high content of carbohydrates, fiber, protein, potassium and magnesium and has low sodium content. These characteristics made copoazú´s pulp an interesting food matrix to innovate inclusion of bioactive compounds in order to obtain functional drinks. Nevertheless, pulp also contains a starch fraction and some other sugars compounds that could be involved in deterioration reactions such non-enzimatic browning and turbidity juice fraction, therefore a clarification treatments is needed to minimize these reactions. This study evaluates the pulp clarification by means of centrifugation and enzymatic treatment and flocculation with gelatin. Copoazu pulp was centrifugated in a 3-18KS Sigma centrifuge at 14000 rpm and a temperature of 4 ° C for 20 min to remove insoluble fiber. 200g Copoazú juice was treated with pectinolytic enzyme (Novozym ® 33095 - polygalacturonase Novozymes ®) or an amylolytic enzyme (™ Amylase AG ® 300 L from Novozymes) in an amount of 100 ppm each to carry out the juice clarification. The enzymatic reaction was conducted at 43 ° C for 60 min in both treatments, after which the enzyme was inactivated by heating at 90 ° C for 5 min. Different compositional traits such as pH, soluble solids (°Brix), sugars content (sucrose, fructose and glucose), organic acids content (malic, citric, ascorbic, succinic and oxalic acids) were assessed together with a sensory acceptation. Results show that every stage of the clarification process changes pulp sugars and acids composition, affecting consumer acceptance.

Carotenoids are key compounds among bioactive food ingredients as they can act as colorants, antioxidants, and pro-vitamine A for some. They are suggested to play a role in the prevention of degenerative diseases. Focus is put here on aryl carotenoids which are only produced by microorganisms in Nature and are of special interest as they combine a polyenic chain with phenolic group(s).