Storage stability of functional beverage prepared from Bitter Gourd, Lemon and Amla for diabetes

Functional beverages become popular in treating non-communicable diseases like diabetes which is influenced by dietary habits and life style of people nowadays. From the standpoint of safe consumption, maintenance of their quality is vital. Therefore, the present study was aimed to evaluate the storage stability of functional beverage prepared from fruits of anti-diabetic potential at ambient temperature.

Three different formulations of bitter gourd: lemon: amla (8: 2: 3, 6: 4: 3 and 5: 5: 3) along with control formulation were prepared and subjected to storage at ambient temperature (30±2°C) and RH of 75-80% in which physico-chemical, sensory and microbial tests were performed at pre-decided intervals.

Analyses indicated that physico-chemical quality parameters of total soluble solids (5.2-3.7), titrable acidity (5.1- 4.5) and ascorbic acid content (45.81-30.48) were significantly decreased while pH increased from 3.5 to 4.0 among formulations during storage. Furthermore, scores for sensorial attributes got decreased and there was no microbial growth in beverage formulations up to two months of storage. Considering these results, formulation T4 prepared with 6% bitter gourd + 4% lemon + 3% amla juices was found to be more acceptable and safer beverage for consumption with minimal percentage change and better retention of quality characteristics which could be commercialized as healthy diet drink for diabetics.