Development of malted and fermented finger millet based beverage blended with beetroot juice

In a post-pandemic world, consumer profiles are continuing to change and new trends are forming, as more have begun working from home. These include direct-to- consumer (DTC), restaurant industry, fresh produce trends. A growing niche in the food and beverage industry is dairy-free and plant-based alternatives. With these considerations, the present study was focused to develop a new variety of blended beverage by utilizing finger millet (ragi) along with beetroot. Development of beverage was done in three steps viz., preparation of malted finger millet flour, preparation of fermented suspension as a base using malted finger millet flour, blending of vegetable juices with fermented finger millet suspension. The effect of different blending ratio and packaging materials for shelf life extension of developed beverage stored at 4±2 ℃, in terms of biochemical, microbial and sensory attributes were studied. From the analysis of observations taken, it was observed and concluded to blend malted and fermented finger millet suspension with beetroot juice (FB2P2) in the ratio of 1:1 and store at 4±20C temperature in glass bottle for 4 weeks to maintain freshness and quality of it with 0.56 of titratable acidity, 5 ⁰Brix of total soluble solids, 5.40 of pH, 6.09 g/100 ml of total sugar content, 75.30% of antioxidant activity, 9.58 g/100 ml of true protein, 48.46 mg/100 ml of calcium, 1.77 mg/100 ml of iron, 1.09 mg/100 ml of zinc, 935.63 mg/100 ml of total phenol content and 682 mg/l of betacyanin with minimum level of microbial infection and good score of acceptability. The cost required for developing this beverage stored at 4±2 ℃ was estimated to be 16 Rs per PET bottle and 21 Rs per glass bottle of 200 ml.