Quality assessment of probiotic weaning mix from fermented cereal-legume blends

• Published in: International journal of agriculture environment & biotechnology Vol. 8; no. 1; pp. 49 - 59
• Main Authors: Semwal, Anupama, Singh, Anupama, Chand, Khan, Shahi, N.C
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New Delhi New Delhi Publishers 01.03.2015
• Subjects: Amino acids; Bacteria; Developing countries; Fermentation; fermentation and LAB; Food; Grain; LDCs; Malnutrition; Milk; Nutrition; Probiotics; Proteins; Sulfur; Underutilized crops; Variables; weaning mix
• ISSN: 0974-1712; 2230-732X
• DOI: 10.5958/2230-732X.2015.00006.6

Weaning mix was developed from underutilized crops of Uttarakhand (finger millet, barnyard millet, black soybean, amaranth grain). Malting and fermentation were adopted as ways of improving cereal protein quality and decreasing anti-nutritional property and probiotic weaning mix was produced using probiotic strain Lactobacillus plantarum. Box-benkhen design of response surface methodology was used to design the experiments design for three variables with three levels [blend ratio (cereals: legume:: 50:50, 60:40, 70:30), fermentation time (12 h, 24 h, 36 h), inoculums concentration (1%, 3%, 5%] and four responses (protein, tannin, water absorption capacity, water absorption index). The probiotic fermentation resulted in favourable changes in nutritionl profile of weaning mix resulting 48.2% increase in protein and 92.3% decrease in tannin content. The optimized set of independent variables (cereals (FM+BM): legume: 70:30 fermented for 25 h with 2.9% inoculum concentration) obtained after statistical analysis, was used to develop final probiotic weaning mix.