EFFECT OF COCOA ADDITION ON THE CENTESIMAL COMPOSITION AND PHYSICOCHEMICAL PROPERTIES OF GOAT'S MILK KEFIR

Summary: Kefir has been gaining increasing attention in Brazil, mainly due to its high nutritional value and the health benefits it offers due to its functional properties. Due to goat's milk's strong and characteristic flavor, adding cocoa appears as an interesting alternative to make the drink more palatable and healthier. This study aimed to develop different kefir formulations with the addition of cocoa and sugar. For this purpose, a central composite rotational design (CCRD) was used, varying the concentrations of sugar and cocoa. An optimized formulation was ultimately determined based on the pH and acidity values. Ten formulations were evaluated, with cocoa concentrations ranging from 0% to 8.0% and sugar from 0% to 8.0%. The optimized formulation, selected by the pH and acidity parameters, contained 6.8% cocoa and 6.8% sugar. This formulation was subjected to analysis of centesimal composition (proteins, lipids, carbohydrates, and ash) and color parameters. The results indicated that the pH values ​​ranged from 4.26 to 4.64, while the acidity ranged from 0.65% to 1.07%. The optimized formulation showed higher levels of proteins (4.09%), carbohydrates (24.79%), and ash (1.47%) compared to the control sample (3.16%, 12%, and 0.81%, respectively) (p<0.05). On the other hand, a reduction in the moisture (75.21%) and lipid (1.70%) values ​​was observed in the control sample (88.01% and 3.00%, respectively). In addition, the color parameters L*, a*, and b* of the optimized sample were 42.3, 8.7, and 12.2, respectively, while those of the control sample were 93.1, -0.9, and 4.1. These results suggest a darker coloration in the optimized sample due to adding cocoa. Thus, kefir enriched with cocoa presented satisfactory results regarding the parameters evaluated, demonstrating that it is a drink with improved functional potential, especially due to its higher protein content.