Bioavailability of Palm Oil Carotenoids Consumed from Different Foods

Crude palm oil (CPO), an ingredient with a high content in provitamins A, is usually consumed associated with foods that could affect carotenoids metabolism. This work aimed to evaluate the influence of foodstuffs prepared with the incorporation of CPO on carotenoids absorption. Thus, we studied carotenoids bioavailability in Cameroonian local meals based on CPO and three different foodstuffs: maize (Zea mais), cassava (Manihot esculente) or black eyed peas (Vigna unguiculata). Modified ‘yellow sauce’ prepared mainly with CPO was used as control meal. Eleven healthy volunteers with age range between 20-30 year and similar body mass index were submitted to the study. A total of four interventions (i.e., meal ingestion) were performed every six days. After meal ingestion blood samples were collected at 0, 2, 4 and 6 h, and carotenoids content were analyzed by HPLC. Results showed that control meal had the highest carotenoids absorption (0.479±0.063 µg.h/ml.), followed by maize (0.329±0.115 µg.h/ml) and cassava (0.141±0.075 µg.h/ml) cakes. Food based on black eyed peas incorporated with CPO showed the smallest increase in blood carotenoids (0.053±0.062 µg.h/ml). Notably, CPO consumption leads to a short term significant increase of blood carotenoids (p<0.05) that declines over time. Our results suggest that the association of CPO with different foodstuffs significantly affects carotenoids bioavailability. This effect seems to be more important for leguminous, followed by tubers and cereals.