CHAPTER ONE
1.0     INTRODUCTION
Bread is a staple food prepared from a dough of flour and water usually by baking. It is a good source of good nutrient such as macronutrients (carbohydrates protein, and fats) and micronutrients (minerals and vitamins) that are essential for human health.
Its origin dates back to the Neolithic era and is still one of the consumed and acceptable staple food products in all parts of the world.
The word bread is used to describe the whole range of different varieties of bread which may vary in weight, shape, crust hardness, c  \rumb cell structure, softness, colour and eating quantity.
There are many combination and proportion of types of flour and other ingredients and also different traditional recipe and modes of preparation of bread. Bread may leavened by different processes ranging from the use of naturally occurring microbes (sourdough recipe) to high pressure artificial aeration method during preparation or baking. However, some products are left unleavened either for preference or for traditional or religions reasons.
In Nigeria, bread has become the second most widely consumed non-indigenous food products after since. It is consumed extensively in most homes, restaurants and hotels. It has been hitherto produced from wheat as a major raw material. In Nigeria, wheat production is limited and wheat flour is imported to meet the local flour needs for baking products. Thus, huge amount of foreign exchange is used every year for the importation of wheat. Effort has been made to promote the use of composite flour in which flour from locally grown gaps replace  a portion of wheat flour for use in bread, thereby decreasing the demand for imported wheat and helping in producing bread.
Composite flour is a mixture of wheat with other materials replacing substantially a portion of wheat flour to form suitable flour for baking purposes. The idea of composite flour began by food and Agricultural organization (FAO) in 1960s to reduce the important dependency of developing countries. (Onyeku et al; 2008, Sibel  2006; Owuamanam, 2007). There is now a substantial quantity of composite bread in the market, such bread requires at least 70% wheat flour to be able to rise because wheat contains gluten.
Wheat in conventional flour, rich in gluten, which makes a better preference for bread baking. It is however expensive because it is not grown in Nigeria due to the unfavourable climatic condition using huge foreign exchange (Igbabu Biana Dooshima, 2014).
The unbridled importation of food by developing countries is detrimental to their local economy and threatens food security. Many developing countries spend large proportion of their foreign exchange earnings on food especially wheat. It is therefore, of economic importance if wheat importation is reduced by the substitution with other locally available raw materials (Onyeku et al; 2008) such as cassava, maize, potato and other carbohydrate flour.
High quantity cassava flour has been identified as a local alternative to substitute part of wheat flour in composite flour in Nigeria due to high production of cassava in Nigeria. In Nigeria, cassava is one of the most important crops in terms of production energy intake and contribution to Agricultural GDP. The possibility of using starchy tubers as part of bread production instead of 100% wheat flour depends on their chemical and physical properties. Those in bakery sector have given reasons for the slow adoption of this technology, including ease of deterioration of cassava bread due to high moisture content and microbial load, fear of the presence of toxic components in cassava and finally bulkiness.
Of interest in this project work is the production of bread using wheat and cassava flour blends flavoured with ginger.
Ginger, an antioxidant have been chosen in this work to be used an a flavouraing agent. Ginger does not only serve an a flavouring agent but also has health benefit.
The new study published in LWT-food science and technology suggests that enriching bread with ginger could boost its antioxidant content without having adverse effect on any functional or sensory properties due to potential health benefits, ginger has gained considerable attention as a botanical dietary supplement in both U.S and Europe in recent years, especially for the use in treatment of chronic inflammatory conditions. Gingerols  are group of phenols found  in ginger that are suggested to offer health benefit (Nathan Gray, 2010).