COMPARATIVE EVALUATION OF ENERGY, AMINO ACIDS AND MINERALS AVAILABILITY OF MAIZE BASED AND MAIZE-ACHA-BASED COMPLEMENTARY INFANT WEANING FOODS

Abstract

The higher prices of fortified nutritious proprietary complementary foods are beyond the purchasing power of the less privilege who forms the bulk the population in most developing countries. Therefore, it becomes necessary to source for alternative. The objective of this paper was to determine comparative evaluation of energy, amino acids and minerals availability of maize-based and maize-acha-based complementary infant weaning foods. Tow foods designated as T1 and T2 were formulated by replacing the content of maize by 0% and 50%. The results showed that T1 had higher proportion of energy due to carbohydrate than T2 while T2 had higher proportion of energy due to protein, proportion of energy due to fat and utilizable energy due to protein than T1. Majority of amino acids were higher in T2 than in T1 and in most cases they were higher than the recommended daily allowances while only serine was higher in T1 than T2. All the minerals studied were higher T2 than T1 except iron and the values of calcium, phosphorus, potassium, sodium, iron, zinc and copper were higher in both treatments than in RDA while magnesium and manganese were lower in both treatments than RDA. It can be concluded that mixed ingredients foods contain higher nutrient profile and are recommended infants.