Development and acceptability of a ready-to-eat beta-carotene rich, maize based supplementary product.

Abstract

Low cost supplementary products using maize were developed and made using extrusion. Beta-carotene rich sources like curry leaf, carrot, red palm oil were used at different level to increase vitamin A precursor Levels and, therefore, vitamin A. Incorporation of curry leaf powder and carrot powder at 30 percent level and 30:70 blend of red palm oil and groundnut oil were found to be more acceptable than the products made with other levels. These products were tasted for acceptability by preschool children and were analysed for energy, protein, fat and beta-carotene contents. The control, fresh and stored supplementary products contained 1.707, 1.922, 1.919 MJ, 11.0, 11.6, 10.36 g protein, 10.2, 10.4, 9.64 g fat, 0, 7.37, 6.72 mg beta-carotene per 100 g, respectively. The loss of beta-carotene in processing and storage of curry leaf and carrot supplemented products was 13.69, 6.25 and 20.24, 8.06 percent, respectively.