Are South African Wild Foods the Answer to Rising Rates of Cardiovascular Disease?

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

A very important and interesting topic was covered in the Review. The paper presents a large amount of data. However, the review is not written in the usual way. Some non-scientific, irrelevant data are described too extensively. On the other hand, chemical composition of fruits and vegetables from South Africa, which are assumed to contribute to rising rates of cardiovascular disease is not presented in sufficient detail.

I suggest publishing the paper after minor revision.

The introduction is written appropriately, relevant references are listed and the issue of cardiovascular disease is adequately presented.

Chapter 3. General phytochemical classes that protect against cardiovascular disease could be reorganized. Subchapters (3.1-3.8) are not equally detailed. It is not entirely clear why much more space is devoted to flavonoids than to other classes of compounds. Although the author gave an explanation why they use the term phenols/polyphenols for non-flavonoids phenols, I must note that this is still not a generally accepted terminology.

Chapter 4. South Africa's healthy wild foods with horticultural potential This chapter is difficult to read, important information is not highlighted enough. The suggestion for the author is to present some data in Table, especially since this is a review paper. In general, this section lacks concrete data on the content of key phytochemicals in the fruits and vegetables that are being written about.

Conclusion

Conclusions are adequately drawn and written.

Minor comments

Line 83 – The comma between the “world” and “scientists” is missing

Lines 300-302 – Reference(s) is missing.

Line 310 – Flavonoids in their free form are called 'aglycones', meaning no sugar is attached... The sentence is too general and unnecessary in this section.

Line 575 – Reference is missing.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer

Thank you very much for taking the time to read this review. I have addressed all minor comments, by adding references where you have requested, adding commas to improve grammar, and removing information that is too basic. 

Regarding section 3, to help make the subchapters appear more even, the section on flavonoids is now broken into three sections. Your point about phenols and flavonoids has also been incorporated into the text to improve accuracy. 

Regarding section 4, as per your request, a Table has been included. 

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments:

Q1: The abstract of this review can not meet the requirements of the scientific paper. For example, 80% of sentences were associated with the background, while only 20% were related to the broad objective. In general, two or three sentences are enough to give the background and objectives. The rest paragraph has to highlight the key findings that the authors collect from the previous studies and then provide a perspective for future research directions.

Q2: Using figures or diagrams, and or tables is recommended to elucidate the findings and demonstrate the discussion, otherwise, it is too wordy and boring for readers to capture the key points of this manuscript.

Author Response

Dear reviewer

Thank you for taking the time to read the current manuscript. 

To your point about the abstract, to make it more results oriented, I have included the names of all the species discussed in the manuscript. The emphasis has hopefully shifted now to reflect more appropriately the structure of the manuscript. 

To you point about graphical representation, I have added three images of indigenous plants, kindly provided by Ben-Erik van Wyk. I have also added a table, and a graphical abstract.