NUTRITIONAL ASSESSMENT OF CEREAL AND PULSE BASED WEANING FOOD SUPLEMENTED WITH EGG AND MILK POWDER

Abstract

The aim of this study was to develop a weaning food for the children by using available resources, for this purpose three weaning food formulations based on wheat, rice, maize, bengal gram, egg and milk powder was processed and evaluated. The prepared formulations were investigated for proximate composition, vitamin and mineral content. The developed food was also evaluated for their sensory characteristics and microbiological quality. Analysis of variance (ANOVA) was used to establish any significant difference in the analytical data for formulated and control weaning foods. The proximate composition results showed that moisture content ranged between (6.81 to 7.70%), protein (17.90 to 19.20%), ash (1.62 to 1.89%) crude fiber (2.50 to 2.83%) and carbohydrate (61.64 to 62.10%). Even though the individual constitute of prepared weaning foods was found to be non significant yet the value was within standard and recommended values of weaning foods. Fat content was 7.67 to 8.10%. Calculated values for total energy provided by the blends ranged from 390.36 to 394.20 kcal/100g dry matter. A simple comparison on sensory evaluation revealed that overall acceptability of S1 (25% Wheat flour+10% Maize flour+22.5% Rice flour +22.5% Bengal gram flour+10% Egg powder+10% Milk powder) was comparable with commercial weaning food. Therefore weaning food prepared with 25% Wheat flour+10% Maize flour+22.5% Rice flour +22.5% Bengal gram flour+10% Egg powder+10% Milk powder formulation can be commercialized in the countries like Bangladesh.