Chapters authored
Fermented Functional Beverages
Functional foods are intensively studied and promoted by various organizations in the field of food and nutrition. They are foods that, by their initial, fortified, enriched, or improved composition, offer health benefits. At global level, there is a great interest in promoting fruit varieties, vegetables, and pseudocereal consumption in order to improve our health. Due to their content in essential compounds such as antioxidants, important amounts of fruits and vegetables should be included in our daily diet. New food matrixes, such as fruit and vegetable juices, have been tested for their ability to deliver probiotic microorganisms and results were promising. Technological progress made possible the use of fruits and vegetables as ideal substrates for probiotics development, due to their content in minerals, vitamins, fibers, and antioxidants. Probiotic products based on vegetables have a continuous development due to the increase in popularity of vegetarianism and the growth of lactose intolerance among the entire world population.
Part of the book: Functional Foods