Determination of Chloride Content in Baby Food

Infant formula based on milk is the best alternative to breast milk. The development and improvement of infant formula aims to achieve the quantitative and qualitative characteristics of breast milk. However, the fact is that breast milk is irreplaceable, and it is therefore recommended that infant formula be used exclusively if there is no possibility for breast-feeding. One of the essential ingredients that is a necessary component of the infant formula is the chloride ion. Insufficient amounts of chloride in baby's diet can cause poor muscle control, delayed speech and slow growth. Today there are several different types of infant formula with different chloride content. If baby is fed by baby food, there is practically no other ways to have enough chlorides in a diet. Since baby food contains all ingredients that are essential to life, it is very complex, and determination of chemical parameters including chloride content is rather hard. Due to the problem of determining the content of chloride in baby food, the aim of this study was to examine the possibility of determining chloride in baby food samples by means of automatic potentiometric titration at several temperatures, using an ion selective electrode (ISE) and classical Mohr’s titration. Apart from measuring the chloride content, the moisture content (by two methods) and water activity were also determined. The results were statistically evaluated by means of statistical techniques, one-way ANOVAs and Tukey tests. The accuracy and precision were calculated. The most precise method was ISE. The study found that the automatic titration method (room temperature) showed the most accurate results.