Antioxidant compounds associated with some types of dietary fibres may be responsible in part for the beneficial effects on health of high-dietary-fibre diets. The antioxidant activity of a high-dietary-fibre mango peel product and of some commercial samples was determined by the ferric thiocyanate colorimetric method. At a concentration of 0.05%, the antioxidant activity of mango peel dietary fibre was 0.75 times as effective as that of 2-tertbutyl-4-hydroxyanisol (BHA) and 1.4 and 3.4 times higher, respectively, than that of French PARAD'OX (a commercial polyphenols concentrate) and of DL-a-tocopherol. All Bran, Quaker Oats, lemon and apple fibre did not exhibit any antioxidant capacity. The obtention of high-dietaryfibre products with bioactive compounds could be useful for the food industry and the antioxidant activity may be a new property to consider in the quality evaluation of these ingredients. © Springer-Verlag 1997.

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