Functional Properties of Composite Flours Used in Breakfast Meal Formulation for Young Children

Abstract

The purpose of the study was to determine the functional properties of composite flours used in breakfast meal formulation for young children. The study adopted experimental design. Flours were produced from the various local foodstuff used for the study which included corn, date, sweet potato and bonga fish. Six samples of the breakfast meal was formulated at different ratios. Standard laboratory analytical method of Association of Official Analytical Chemists (AOAC) procedure was used to determine the functional properties of the samples. The functional properties analyzed were water absorption capacity (WAC), oil absorption capacity (OAC), swelling index (SI), foam capacity (FC), gelation temperature (GT) and bulk density (BD). The results on the functional properties shows the samples contained a reasonable and recommendable good amounts of WAC (1.93-3.00), AOC (1.79-2.41), BD (0.51-0.62), FC (17.63-20.87), SI (2.95-3.87) and GT (85.65-87.52). The result obtained showed that the functional properties of the breakfast composite flours are appreciable and the formulations are suitable to be used as meal for young children. The study recommends amongst others that the samples should be further characterized to determine their suitability for various applications, such as food formulation, nutritional supplementation, and pharmaceutical development.