Probiotics in Vegetable Juices : Tomato (Solanum Lycopersicum), Carrot(Daucus Carota, Subsp. Sativus) and Beetroot Juice (Beta Vulgaris)

Abstract

Twenty first century has witnessed a significant rise in the awareness regarding healthy lifestyle among the consumers and food being the important step towards a healthy life, numerous health promoting food products have gained prominent place in the food market. One such food component which is proven to have impressive health benefit is the probiotic bacteria. Probiotics are known to human kind since ages as they are important component in fermented milk products, however the use of probiotics in non-dairy product is a novel method for the delivery of probiotics. Awareness regarding health benefits of dairy products is long known to consumers but non dairy products too have good amount of micro and macronutrients and antioxidants as well which are a boon to human body. Delivery of probiotics through non-dairy products will be beneficial for consumers who are lactose intolerant who are deprived of benefits of probiotics by dairy products. This studies aim at developing novel vegetable juices containing probiotic bacteria. Three different strains of bacteria will be used i.e. Lactobacillus plantarum, Lactobacillus acidophilus, Lactobacillus delbrueckii in carrot, beetroot and tomato juice. The viability of the bacteria will be checked after a specific duration of time of fermentation by Koch’s plate count method. The vegetable used for juices (carrot, beetroot, tomato) consist of high amount of antioxidants like carotenoids in carrot, betaxanthins and betacyanins in beetroot, lycopene in tomato. These antioxidant provide numerous health benefits to human body. The antioxidant activity in the juices will be checked before and after fermentation by HPLC and spectroscopic methods. This product will be especially useful for the people who are lactose intolerant who cannot intake probiotics via milk and milk products. Vegetable juices also have almost zero fat content and high in fiber so the people who are on a fat free diet can consume this product.