2025

Permanent URI for this collection

https://escholar.umt.edu.pk/handle/123456789/10099

Browse

Browsing 2025 by Author "Natasha Kiran"

Now showing 1 - 1 of 1
  • Thumbnail Image
    Item
    Development and characterization of multigrain crackers as a healthy alternative to commercial crackers
    (UMT, Lahore, 2025) Natasha Kiran
    With the rising global interest in health conscious eating habits, there has been a growing demand for functional food products that offer both nutritional significance and convenience. Replacement of wheat flour with quinoa, oats, chickpea and urad daal flours in these crackers present an opportunity to enhance their nutritional profile, physiochemical functioning and antioxidant properties. Formulation of crackers (T1, T2, T3 and T4) with these ingredients provides a convenient and tasty way to incorporate them into daily diet. In this study these multigrain flours were used in different percentages to formulate crackers were assessed for compositional parameters, sensory attributes, physical parameter, antioxidant activity and are compared with conventional commercial crackers. The results showed that addition of multigrain flours has moisture content from 3.45±0.21% to 5.49±0.41%, ash content from 4.89±0.39% to 5.22±0.60%, fat content from 5.20±0.45% to 7.91±0.10%, fiber from 5.00±0.05% to 6.00±0.03%, protein from 6.92±1.67 to 11.81±2.86, and carbohydrate from 66.91±3.44% to 71.95±1.43% in comparison to the commercial crackers whose moisture content ranges from 2.33±0.22% to 1.84±0.24%, ash content from 4.64±0.05% to 5.19±0.44%, fat content from 14.5±0.16% to 16.7±0.55%, fiber from 2.73±0.57% to 1.90±0.02%, protein from 6.12±2.66% to 9.47±1.65%, and carbohydrate from 64.98±0.98% to 69.51±2.97%. Mean L*, a* and b* values for formulated crackers decreased as compared to commercial crackers due to the addition of increase percentage of multigrain flours in substitution to refined flour. The higher TPC values in T4 (74.70±18.93 mg GAE/g), TFC in T1 (243.01±33.26 µg QE/100g), DPPH in T2 (13.10±0.85%) and FRAP in T4 (465.11±98.71 µmol TEQ/g) shows that multigrain crackers are rich in polyphenolic, flavonoid and bioactive compounds which overall increases antioxidant and scavenging free radical activity. However, T4 gained the highest score (7.40) among all the formulated crackers in sensory evaluation and is closely matched to the score of commercial cracker C3 (7.65). Furthermore, the incorporation of these multigrain flours can add texture, flavor and visual appeal to the crackers, enhancing their market ability.