Characteristics of Eutectic Compositions of Restructured Palm Oil Olein,Palm Kernel Oil and Their Mixtures

The physico-chemical characteristics of blends of palm olein and palm kernel oil which were further modified by chemical interesterification were studied. The slip melting points of non-interesterified blends were 19.7, 16.2, 14.5, 14.5 and 14.4 °C while those of the chemically interesterified blends were 17.7, 16.2, 19.8, 18.7 and 18.7 °C at 40, 30, 20, 10 and 0% palm kernel oil, respectively. Chemical interesterification lowered the solid fat content of the pure samples and blends across different temperatures except 90% palm olein at 15 °C where the solid fat content was higher than for non-interesterified samples. Palm kernel oil, palm olein and their blends before and after chemical interesterification, crystallized mainly in the β′ form. However, chemical interesterification modified the microstructure from a combination of fat particles with void regions of crystalline materials to fat particles without regions of void crystalline materials. Palm olein and palm kernel oil blends are mainly used for food preparation in Nigeria. This study has shown that there are no significant differences in the physical and chemical properties of non-chemically interesterified and chemically interesterified blends of palm olein and palm kernel oil. This implies that blending of palm olein and palm kernel oil without chemical interesterification can provide the fluidity desirable at ambient temperatures for food applications in the tropics.