The hydrolysis of saponin-rich extracts from fenugreek and quinoa improves their pancreatic lipase inhibitory activity and hypocholesterolemic effect

•Saponin-rich extracts and their hydrolysates inhibited the pancreatic lipase.•Improved inhibition of hydrolyzed quinoa extract, not attributable to sapogenins.•None of the saponin extracts reduced the bioaccessibility of cholesterol.•Both hydrolyzed extracts had similar or superior effects than β-sitosterol.•Hydrolysis allowed producing multibioactive extracts for treating hyperlipidemia. Saponins are promising compounds for ameliorating hyperlipidemia but scarce information exists about sapogenins, the hydrolyzed forms of saponins. Saponin-rich extracts and their hydrolysates from fenugreek (FE, HFE) and quinoa (QE, HQE), and saponin and sapogenin standards, were assessed on the inhibition of pancreatic lipase and interference on the bioaccessibility of cholesterol by in vitro digestion models. All extracts inhibited pancreatic lipase (IC50 between 1.15 and 0.59 mg/mL), although the hydrolysis enhanced the bioactivity of HQE (p = 0.014). The IC50 value significantly correlated to the saponin content (r = −0.82; p = 0.001). Only the hydrolyzed extracts showed a reduction of bioaccessible cholesterol (p