An investigation of Basotho culinary practices and consumer acceptance of Basotho traditional bread

Abstract

The overall aim of this study was to investigate the culinary practices of Basotho with regard to traditional bread, to characterise breads and to apply the cultural hedonic framework to describe consumers’ perceptions about the acceptance of traditional Basotho breads. The culinary practices of Basotho have been transferred from one generation to the other without or with very limited documentation. The only sourced information was a research done by Ashton in 1939. The knowledge of traditional bread preparation and its acceptance by Basotho consumers is currently limited. Food practices are embedded in culture and every culture has specifications pointing to the hedonic characteristics of food such as taste, appearance, flavour and aroma, which are determined by the context in which the food is selected or consumed. It was important to understand the cultural hedonic framework underlying Basotho bread acceptance. The study was exploratory and descriptive in nature. Food acceptance and cultural hedonic framework theories were used to explore the reasons underlying the choice of bread. The study employed both quantitative and qualitative techniques of collecting data in the three phases. Data related to culinary practices was collected by a structured questionnaire and focus groups in phase 1. Phase 2 was the standardisation of recipes obtained in phase 1. The standardised breads were characterised in phase 3 by describing selected physico–chemical and sensory characteristics of dough and breads. The responses to the questionnaire and descriptive sensory evaluation were statistically analysed and the grounded theory approach was used to analyse data from focus groups. Ten Basotho breads prepared from wheat, maize and sorghum were identified in both rural and urban areas of Lesotho. Preparation of traditional Basotho breads involves preparation of grains (washing, sorting, soaking, dehulling, dry milling and wet milling), mixing/kneading, fermentation and cooking. Steaming method is applied to all breads, but baking and pot-roasting are used for wheat breads only. Younger participants were less familiar with maize and sorghum breads than they were with wheat breads. Unfamiliarity with the sensory attributes of these products, contributed to their lower acceptance. The older participants were familiar with all traditional breads and valued them for use in the important Basotho cultural ceremonies. The movement from the rural areas to urban areas has also changed the traditional bread practices to modern westernised ways. This therefore placed Lesotho into both higher and lower cultural hedonic context such that rural and old people are higher context cultures and urban and younger people are lower context cultures. The type of grain flour used influenced the sensory characteristics of breads. Red sorghum breads reflected dark red crumb and white maize breads reflected white crumb. Fine flour produced lighter breads than coarse flour of the same cereal type. Non-wheat breads were more crumbly, hard and fibrous than wheat breads. The instrumental texture analysis showed plastic deformation for wheat breads, brittle deformation for non-wheat breads and elastic deformation for standard breads. It is recommended that more attention be given to the development, standardisation and improvement of traditional bread recipes in order to produce bread with acceptable sensory attributes. The findings of this study help to understand and interpret the overall scope of Basotho attitude towards breads for the maximum utilisation of local grains in Lesotho. The study adds the Basotho perspective of cultural food acceptance to the excisting global knowledge of food choice regarding traditional food products.