Aceitabilidade de Muffins de beterraba por crianças na fase escolar do município de Borborema/PB.

Abstract

The school phase covers the period of life from 7 to 9 years, 11 months and 29 days of age. At this stage, in addition to the family, the school begins to play a prominent role in children's health, through the National School Feeding Program (PNAE), children receive health education through strategic activities to adopt healthy eating practices, in order to prevent nutritional deficiencies. So that the nutrients can be used in their entirety, the full use of the food is of paramount importance. The present work aimed to evaluate the acceptability of “Beetroot Muffins” prepared from the full use of the food, by school-age children enrolled in schools in the Municipality of Borborema, PB, in order to provide the consumption of all nutritional components present in food, as well as encouraging a healthy and diversified diet. The study included 57 schoolchildren of both sexes, enrolled between the first and fifth grade of elementary school at two schools, Jaldete Guedes Pereira (school 1) and Francisco Cardoso da Silva (school 2). The study evaluated the acceptance of two preparations made with beetroot, formulation A (without peel) and B (with peel), through a sensory evaluation using the “Facial Hedonic Scale” method for students from the 1st to the 5th year. There was good acceptance by the students, with grades varying between 4.4±1.12 and 4.5±1.12, demonstrating that there was no significant difference between the samples. The Beetroot Muffin without peel (formulation A) obtained an acceptability of 94.3% for the first school and 90.7% in the second school, with the full use of beetroot, formulation B obtained 88.1% acceptability, school 1 and 88%, school 2. It is concluded that the acceptability index of Beetroot Muffins reached a percentage higher than 85%, a target recommended for a preparation to be considered accepted by schoolchildren, both in formulation A and formulation B, signaling, therefore, potential for the possibility of inclusion in the school menu. In this way, the relevance of studies aimed at the full use of food becomes evident, a promising strategy for children to create healthy eating habits from childhood, promoting health and well-being for adequate and nutritious growth.