Nutritional deficiencies in iron and zinc remain real public health problems for children in the town of Maroua in the Far North of Cameroon despite it has being a dairy production area. The availability of foods rich in micronutrients including the combination of some of these foods could help to improve coverage of children's nutritional needs.
The objective of this work was to formulate a milk product locally called kossam and rice porridge enriched with baobab fruit pulp to cover the nutritional needs in iron and zinc of children in the city of Maroua-Cameroon. A weekly food consumption survey was carried out in the town of Maroua after which samples of the different foods consumed by the children were taken and weighed. The most consumed products (kossam) and rice porridge have been enriched in various doses with baobab fruit pulp powder, resulting in improved products approved by sensory analyses. Sensory analyzes were determined following standard protocols.
Sensory parameters revealed a higher panelist preference for the kossam F530 formulation (4.75) not significantly different (p ˃ 0.05) from the preference for the standard F550 (5.00). Also, a non-significant difference (p ˃ 0.05) regarding the general appreciation of the formulation of rice porridge (5.00) and ordinary rice porridge (4.63). Iron and zinc experienced a significant increase in levels (p ˂ 0.05). The daily diet of children coupled with the consumption of the F530 formulation and the formulated porridge makes it possible to cover 100% of children's daily iron requirements, and 51.03% coverage of children's daily zinc requirements.