Antioxidant dietary fibres: Potential functional food ingredients from plant processing by-products

Abstract

The number of dietary fibre enriched food products introduced to the food market has been increased due to several beneficial effects of dietary fibres, mainly on the digestive system. In recent years, there has been a trend towards finding new sources of dietary fibre, such as agronomic by-products. Dietary fibres produced from by-products of antioxidant rich foodstuffs comprise important and healthy antioxidants such as polyphenols and carotenoids. This brings along the antioxidant dietary fibre (ADF) concept, which combines beneficial effects of both dietary fibres and antioxidants. This review focuses on the present knowledge in the literature about the sources and potential applications of ADFs as functional ingredients in the food industry. Also it is aimed to attract the attention of producers to the economic importance of converting those food processing by-products into healthy value-added products.