Fine Tuning a Bile-Enzymatic-Gravimetric Total Dietary Fiber Method

A recently proposed bile-enzymatic-gravimetric total dietary fiber (TDF) method was modified and the new procedure was compared with the original method, the traditional AOAC enzymatic-gravimetric determination (AOAC Official Method 985.29), and another simplified AOAC procedure by analyzing several diet composites, including National Institute of Standards and Technology 1548 total diet reference material. The original and modified bile-enzymatic-gravimetric procedures also were compared by analyzing 9 food samples from a collaborative study of the original method. The modified method consistently yielded values about 10% lower than the original method but closer to reference values and to values from AOAC Official Method 985.29, suggesting results that are more in line with accepted TDF standard methodology. Our modified method was used to analyze 180 fresh-frozen diet composites with TDF values ranging from 0.6 to 3.2 g/100 g wet weight. Samples were from 2 multicenter feeding studies sponsored by the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute: DELTA (Dietary Effects on Lipoproteins and Thrombogenic Activity) and DASH (Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension). The mean relative standard deviation (RSD) for duplicate analyses was 1.1%. For 40 assays of a quality control diet composite over 9 months, the standard deviation was 0.1 g/100 g wet weight (4.9% RSD), indicating the method's excellent precision for routine use.