Nutritional Evaluation of Weaning Food Produced From Combination of Rice, Corn and Sorghum Flour Blends

The use of rice, sorghum and corn flour blends in the formulation of low cost nutritive weaning foods diet were studied. The weaning food samples were analyzed for their nutritional, functional and sensory properties. The nutritional composition of the samples showed that the carbohydrate content increased with increasing inclusion of rice flour. The functional properties of the samples showed an increase in the swelling index and water absorption capacity from diet I to diet III while bulk densities were relatively constant. The sensory evaluation carried out on weaning food samples after reconstituting into gruel with warm water, milk, glucose showed that all the samples were well accepted by the judges. The results of the proximate composition showed that there was no significance difference in the protein contents of the weaning food samples. The result indicates that sample C has the lowest moisture content and therefore will have high storage stability. The fat composition of the weaning food showed that the samples have low fat contents. The carbohydrate contents of the weaning food showed that there is high level of carbohydrate contents amongst the samples. It is therefore recommended that substituting up to 10% protein to the weaning food will enhances its nutritional composition