DEVELOPMENT OF BIO-FORTIFIED BEVERAGE FOR HIDDEN HUNGER
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Date
2022
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Abstract
Micronutrient deficiency referred to as ‘Hidden hunger’ is a huge burden in terms
of social, health and economic aspects. Cost effective strategies are in need of the hour
for a developing country like India, where, calcium, vitamin A, vitamin D, vitamin B12,
folate, iodine and iron deficiencies are prevalent to an alarming extent. Although fruit and
vegetables are capable of sufficing this need, it is difficult for the Indian population to
diversify the diet on a regular basis. Moreover, consumer preference has seen a paradigm
shift towards healthy convenience foods in recent times. Therefore, in order to combat
the micronutrient deficiencies, a fortified milk based beverage using fruits and vegetables
as fortificants has been developed. The fortificants such as carrot, moringa, mushroom,
dates and seaweed have been incorporated in skim milk in the form of juice in the levels
(15, 5, 6, 2 and 1 per cent, respectively) optimized using conjoint analysis as statistical
tool. The level of sugar (10 per cent), nature identical colorant (0.06 per cent) and
flavorant (0.15 per cent) were added at optimized levels using sensory evaluation.
The proximate study for the developed beverage was carried out and the colour intensity
of the product was analyzed using Hunter colorimeter. The physico-chemical properties
such as pH, titratable acidity, total soluble solids, total solids, viscosity; sensory attributes
including colour and appearance, taste, flavour, overall acceptability and microbiological
parameters such as total plate count, coliform, spores and yeast and mold counts of the
fortified beverage were estimated at an interval of 30 days for a storage period upto 120
days at ambient temperature. No growth of micro-organisms was observed till 90^ day
and microbial growth found at the end of storage period (120^ day). Also the
micronutrients, vitamins (vitamin A and D) and minerals (iron and iodine) in the fortified
beverage were quantified in the storage intervals and it was found that it has met the
recommended daily allowances. However, the concentrations decreased progressively
during the storage period.