NUTRITIONAL VALUE OF CHIVE EDIBLE FLOWERS

Abstract

Edible flowers have been used in traditional and herbal medicine since ancient times, but its nutritional value have not been studied in depth. The lavender-pink globular flower heads of chive not only beautify the garden or dried bouquets, but they can also be used to prepare chive vinegar, salads or soups. The aim of this work was to determine the nutritional value of flowers of the chive cultivated at the Horticultural Experiment Station in Dołuje (north-western Poland) in the years 2009 and 2010. In the raw plant material, the content of dry matter, total ash, total protein, titratable acidity, vitamin C as L-ascorbic acid, total and reducing sugars, fat, crude fibre, polyphenols, total carotenoids, chlorophylls, pungency, free radical scavenging activity and energy value were measured. The Allium schoenoprasum L. dried flowers were extracted by ethanol at 50C and at room temperature (maceration). The obtained extracts were analyzed by GC-MS method. The analysis revealed that the flowers contained much important fatty acids with palmitic acid (7.94–16.94%), linoleic acid (7.63–13.45%) and stearic acid (3.13–31.16%), the most abundant saturated and unsaturated fatty acids, as well as γ-sitosterol (3.41–6.42%), campesterol (0.34–0.66%), fucosterol (0.29–0.51%) and vitamin E (0.16–0.49%). Moreover, in the dry plant material content of total flavonoids was assessed.

Keywords

• Allium schoenoprasum L.
• chemical compounds
• biological value
• antioxidants
• GC
• MS