Mar 30, 2019
THE TIMES OF INDIA
MANIPAL: In an attempt to eradicate malnutrition among children, interdisciplinary students of Manipal Academy of Higher Education have developed a low cost energy bar —‘Bargrains’.
The bar is a combination of wholesome grains and millets bound together with natural sweetener, jaggery. The concept which was innovated during the Grand Challenge Udupi, not only qualified in the top three teams but won a prize. The team further aims to develop the idea forward and commercialize it.
Chef K Thirugnanasambantham, principal of Welcomgroup Graduate School of Hotel Administration (WGSHA), said that it was made using grains and millets that we tend to forget in our regular diet. It is a unique recipe that combines all things healthy, ingredients whose inclusion in our diet is very important.
He added that this year’s theme for ‘The Grand Challenge Udupi’ was ‘Empowering the Under-served’.
This low cost energy bar was made with the vision of serving a healthier alternative to children below the age of 5, focusing on the underprivileged, poverty-stricken who don’t consume enough or the required calories in a day. The bar is a sweet mix of pearl millet, kodu millet, broken wheat, peanuts and many more grains and millets.
Team mentor and chef Thirugnanasambantham added that in the long run they aim to approach the government and work along with them to make these bars a part of the meals provided to children in schools especially in anganwadi centres. Currently vegetarian kids are given bananas while others eggs. Bargrains can replace both banana and egg as it contains all the needed nutrients. “Although our focus group comprised of underprivileged and undernourished, the samples of our very own energy bar have impressed everyone who has tasted them,” he said adding that bar can cost as low as Rs 5.
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