Food-to-Food Fortification of Rice Flour (Swarna Cv.) using Basil, Marjoram and Spearmint Dried Leaves Powder: A Physicochemical and Nutritional Study

Food-to-Food fortification is an emerging technique to enrich nutrient-deficient foods by adding foods with relatively high amounts of one or more than one type of micro and macronutrients. The dried leaves of herbs like basil, marjoram, and spearmint have excellent nutritional properties. These can fortify staple raw materials like rice flour (RF) to produce gluten-free fortified products. Thus, in this research, an attempt was made to find the effect of these dried herbs on the physicochemical and nutritional properties of RF with skim milk powder (SMP) (3% w/w) at different fortification levels (FLs) (1-4% w/w). The physicochemical and nutritional properties viz., water absorption index (WAI), water solubility index (WSI), oil absorption capacity (OAC), water absorption capacity (WAC), solubility (SL), iron (Fe), and proximate analysis was found out. Results showed insignificant (p>0.05) change in all physicochemical properties at 1% addition of marjoram, spearmint, and basil as compared to control (RF + SMP). However, a significant (p<0.05) increase in WAI was noticed at 2% addition of marjoram, spearmint, and basil. Further, no significant (p>0.05) change in WAI was noticed up to the highest FL in all fortificants. Similar behavior was observed with WSI, only in the case of marjoram; however, no significant (p>0.05) change was observed with spearmint at all FLs. In addition, basil at 4% fortification causes a significant (p<0.05) increase in WSI. In WAC, neither marjoram nor spearmint resulted in any significant (p>0.05) change at all FLs except basil at 4%. A similar resulted was noticed with SL. Nevertheless, a significant (p<0.05) color change was observed at all FLs. The iron, protein, and crude fiber were significant (p<0.05) improved at 4%. A similar result was noticed with carbohydrate, energy, and crude fat at a higher FL. The study will help food processors to formulate fortified foods using dried herbs.