Production, acceptability and microbiological evaluation of weaning food formulations.

Weaning food formulations were produced from pearl millet cultivar (SOSAT C-88), cowpea and groundnut in the ratio of 70:20:10 and 5 per cent malt from six pearl millet cultivars (SOSAT C-88, ZANGO, EX-BORNO, ICMV IS 94206, GWAGWA, GB 8735) and one sorghum cultivar (ICSV III) were added to produce seven formulations plus the one without malt. Microbiological quality of eight weaning food formulations was evaluated. Twenty weaning mothers were used to determine the acceptability of gruels from the eight weaning food formulations using a nine-point hedonic scale. Addition of 5 per cent malt did not affect the microbial count of weaning food formulations. Saccharomyces cerevisiae, Klebsiella aerogenes and Aspergillus niger were found in all the weaning food formulations. Shigella and Salmonella were not encountered in this study. Addition of 5 per cent SOSAT C-88, ZANGO, EX-BORNO, ICMV-IS 94206 and GWAGWA malt improved the taste and texture of weaning food formulations. The population of micro-organisms isolated from weaning formulations was not high enough to produce effective dose. However, the need for processors of weaning foods to adopt strict hygiene practices cannot be overemphasized.