With the decline of the human fascination over agrochemistry and synthetic improvement of nature, the world s turning back to natural food and natural medecine. Chokeberry fruit seem to be a landmark on this road back due to their unique capacity for combining the qualities of both healthy food and a therapeutic agent which can be prescibed for many common diseases of our age.

Chokeberries are used as an excellent flavouring to various fruit products such as wines and juices as well as jams, jellies and all sort of confectionery stuffing. The fruit are also processed into glazed chockeberries and a natural red colouring used in food industry.

The processing of fresh chokeberries is not difficult. Although the fruit soft, their shock-resistance allows to store them for a long time. Chokeberry products have got a characteristic slightly tannic taste, a beautiful ruby colour and they maintain their medical characteristics.

Chokeberry fruit contain may vitamines, with an outstanding proportion of vitamine P of which the plant is considered to be the richest source in the world. This unusual content of vitamin P, so uncommom with other fruit, gives good grounds for pronouncing chokeberry a medical plant. The fruit, juice and products made of chokeberry may be recommended in the treatment of hypertension, arteriosclerosis, hemmorrhoids, gastritis and also radiation sickness.

For more details apply to PPH "EGGERT" . My firm deals with the production and marketing of the highest quality plant material as well as the sales of fresh and frozen chokeberry fruit along with chokeberrrry products.

Chemical composition, therapeutic values and usefulness for food processing

The growing interest in chokeberry owes to the unique properties of its fruit, which are excellent raw material for processing and are classified as medicinal plants for their chemical composition.

The chemical composition of black chokeberry fruit may slightly vary depending on the region and the weather conditions during the vegetation period. Fresh, ripe chokeberry fruit contain 74-83% of water and 26-17% of dry mass respectively. Chokeberry fruit contain ca. 18% soluble substances, such as sugars, acids, tannins, pectins, pigments and mineral salts. The biggest share among the soluble substances are sugars, whose total content in the fresh fruit mass is 6.2-10.8%, where 4.3-5.9% are monosaccharide, fructose and glucose, while the rest is saccharose.

The content of organic acids in black chokeberry fruit is relatively insignificant - expressed in malic acid it is 0.7-1.3%. Thus, the sugar/acid ratio is quite high and it is ca. 8.

The presence of tannins contributes to the flavour of chokeberry fruit, the content of which in ripe fruit is ca. 0.35%. Tannins give the fruit their characteristic flavour, so much valued in food processing industry, winemaking in particular.

Chokeberry fruit show high contents of pectin substances (between 0.63 and 0.75%) and therefore can be used for jelly products and marmalades.

The content of ashes is higher than in other berries, such as currants, raspberries or gooseberries, i.e. 1.55 g of ash substances per 100 g of fruit. Ash substances contain significant amounts of calcium (ca. 7.8%) and very valuable microelements, such molybdenum (0.32-1.88 mg%), manganese (3.66-9.64 mg%), copper (0.81-2.97 mg%) and boron (0.15-0.71 mg%).

Due to its valuable content of vitamins, chokeberry is qualified as a medicinal plant, particularly useful in the treatment of civilization-related diseases, such as cardiovascular diseases, gastritis and - as demonstrated in the recent studies - chokeberry fruit help neutralize the detrimental effect of radioactive radiation on a human body.

Chokeberry fruit also contain vitamins: P, C, PP, B2, B9, E and carotene (pro-Vitamin A). Among those, the content of Vitamin P is incomparably high compared to other fruits - it varies between 1200 and 3977 mg% in fresh fruit, 2500-3500 mg% on the average. In chokeberry fruit Vitamin P appears in the bioflavonoid group of: colourless catechin 600-1500 mg%, red anthocyanins 600-1300 mg% and insignificant amounts of yellow flavonoids.

Owing to such a high content of P-active compounds, chokeberry fruit and their preserves are used in the treatment of certain conditions. Effective 4 April 1959, the Pharmacological Board of the former USSR Ministry of Health recommended black chokeberry fruit and juice for wide clinical use in the treatment of hypertension, arteriosclerosis and gastritis. In 1966 industrial scale production of Vitamin C+P started, with ascorbic acid and Vitamin P obtained from dried chokeberry pomace (containing 16600-18250 mg%) as a raw material. This medical product is recommended in the treatment of haemorrhoids, capillary conditions, haemorrhages and - in the first place - hypertension. In Poland, chokeberry juice is the basis for geriatric drugs.

The contents of vitamins in chokeberry fruit are as follows: Vitamin C 14-28 mg% (max. up to 50 mg%), carotene (pro-Vitamin A) 1.8-2.5 mg%, B2 0.1 mg%, B9 0.05-0.1 mg%, E 0.5-0.8 mg%, PP 0.6-0.8 mg%.

Juice extracted from fresh chokeberry fruit (7-9% sugars, 0.8-1.1% acids, ca. 400 mg% Vitamin P, all the above mentioned vitamins and microelements, as well as small amounts of yeast and natural antibiotics) is widely used in medicine and food processing. With fresh fruit the juice extraction rate is ca. 75%, and with frozen fruit it increases up to 80%. With the addition of sugar, chokeberry juice tastes nice and can be used both for immediate consumption and for jelly desserts, colouring and as an additive to carbonated waters and other drinks. Natural chokeberry juice has an intensive and clear ruby-red colour, which makes it ideal to blend with colourless juices, e.g. apple juice, which is of particular value in winemaking.

Fresh chokeberry fruit can be widely used in food processing, particularly as a colouring and vitamin additive to other common and less valuable fruit. Preserves, jelly desserts, jams, marmalades, confectionery fillings and other products have a nice and unique taste and a beautiful colour. Particularly valuable are the preserves, in which the P-active compounds can be conserved almost intact and one tablespoon of chokeberry preserves meets the daily requirements for Vitamin P. Candied fruit, used in confectionery, have similar properties.

Dried chokeberry fruit are also a valuable raw material, from which - when properly dried - a beautifully coloured therapeutic extract can be prepared. 50 g of dried fruit can supply a therapeutic daily dose of P-active compounds in the treatment of above mentioned conditions. As a preventive measure, dried chokeberry teas or in composition with other dried fruit (e.g. rosehip or hawthorn) can be used.

Last but not least, the pomace from the juice extraction process is used to extract pigments. As a waste product, pomace can be a valuable material to obtain natural ruby-red dyes. Natural dyes are now becoming more and more popular in food processing industry as the use of synthetic dyes becomes less common.

Prepared by:

Piotr Eggert, MSc Eng.