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Introduction
Recently, considerable research is being carried out to reduce the high incidence of malnutrition and increased dietary diseases by exploiting several available but under-utilized plant legumes. Such legumes include the bambara nuts, the baobab seeds, soybeans, tamarinds seeds and a host of others. This is an attempt to improve the nutritional level of people and the diets of various categories of people vulnerable to nutritional imbalances.
Tamarind, Tamarindus indica L ., is a multipurpose tropical fruit tree used primarily for its fruits. The fruits are eaten fresh or processed into juices, drinks or confectionaries (El-Siddig et al. , 2006). The tamarind tree produces edible, pod-like fruits which are used extensively in cuisines around the world. The fruit has a fleshy, juicy and acidulous pulp. It is mature when the flesh is coloured brown or reddish-brown. It is best described as sweet and sour in taste, and is high in acid, sugar, B vitamins and calcium. Tamarind is a versatile fruit, which can be used for many purposes. The unique sweet/sour flavour of the pulp is popular in cooking and flavouring (Ahmed et al. , 2007). The most valuable and commonly used part of the tamarind tree is the fruit. The pulp constitutes 30-50 per cent of the ripe fruit, the shell and fibre account for 11-30 per cent and the seed about 25-40 per cent (Shankaracharya, 1998). Tamarind is widely grown as a subsistence crop for meeting local demands and is also grown commercially. Numerous national programmes have recognized tamarind as an under-utilized crop with wider potential (Samantray et al. , 2013). Further exploitation of tamarind can therefore provide added income for poor rural people, thereby improving their well-being and livelihood.
Tamarind seed is a by-product of the tamarind pulp industry which is often wasted after the extraction of the pulp; over 90 per cent of the tamarind seeds are reported as waste annually, while less than 10 per cent is being utilized by the non-food industry. Tamarind seed, a waste in the tamarind pulp industry, can be valuable for use as a protein supplement in food due to its high protein content (El-Siddig et al. , 2006). Tamarind seed comprises the seed coat or testa (20-30 per cent) and the kernel or...