Formulation and proximate evaluation of complementary diets from locally available foods in southwestern Nigeria

摘要

Objective: Complementary foods in Nigeria among low-income households are based on staple cereals. Malnutrition among the affected infants could be attributed to unfortified or poorly-fortified cereal-based complementary foods. The present study was conducted to formulate composite blends using locally available but cheap cereals and legumes, chemically evaluate their respective nutritive values, compare them with most traditionally used sieved maize pap ('ogi'), and also evaluate the acceptability of the composite blends. Methods: Four composite blends were formulated from common white bean, soya bean, groundnut, fluted pumpkin, bitter leaf, crayfish, dried tomato and palm oil with unsieved yellow maize and guinea corn as the project food base. Standard procedures of Association of Official Analytical Chemists were used to determine the proximate chemical composition while atomic absorption spectrophotometer was used to determine the mineral element composition. Sensory evaluation to test their acceptability was assessed with 25 panelists using four organoleptic attributes with a five point hedonic scale. Results: The results showed that protein, fat, ash, calcium, iron and zinc contents of the four composite blends were higher than in the traditionally most-used sieved maize pap. The results further showed that formulation with UYM + GC + GT + UG + BL + CF + O was the most acceptable composite blend by the panelists. Conclusion: We concluded that nursing mothers do not have to spend so much money to take care of the nutritional status of their infants by adopting these new formulations of complementary foods.