Nutrient, Anti-Nutrient Composition and Sensory Attributes of Biscuit Made from Millet-Soy Blends

Biscuits are commonly given to children as they grow to become toddlers, and as such efforts should be made to formulate biscuits to contribute to meeting their energy and other nutrient needs.Objective: The potential of malted millet and soy in various blends for the development of toddler biscuits was investigated.Materials and methods: Malted millet and soybean seeds were processed into flour. Biscuits were formulated from the flour blends using optimisation through graphical illustration of linear programming (samples A, E and D), and compared with the traditional trial and error method (samples B and C). Nutrient and anti-nutrient content and sensory attributes of the biscuit samples were evaluated using standard methods.Results: Optimised biscuit samples had low moisture content, ranging from 4.92% to 5.42%. Protein content of the samples ranged from 11.47% - 20.39% and energy values from 422.36kcal – 473.80kcal. Sample A had highest value of β – carotene (418.40IU) and vitamin E (0.29ppm). Calcium content of the biscuit samples ranged from 994.13 – 1218.13% for all the samples, iron was 32.18 – 61.96 ppm and zinc was 28.41 – 52.08 ppm. Oxalate and trypsin inhibitor ranged from 736.50 mg/kg to 1002.40 mg/kg and 5.82mg/kg to 60.52 mg/kg, with phytate (1450.00mg/kg – 4650.00 mg/kg) and (1045.00mg/kg - 9080.00mg/kg) respectively. Sample A was also the most preferred in the sensory evaluation.Conclusion: The study showed that the biscuit made from millet-soy blends contained appreciable quantities of protein, β – carotene, vitamin E, calcium and zinc. The anti-nutritional composition of the biscuits were found to be within acceptable limits