The final results of “MENU- Marine Macroalgae: alternative recipes for a daily nutritional diet”, a project that developed a wide range of sweet and savory dishes based on different macroalgae from the Portuguese coast, will be presented next Saturday, September 24, at 3 pm, at the Municipal Auditorium of Figueira da Foz.
In addition to the presentation of the results, the scientific team and the project’s partner companies offer a tasting of the food products developed, open to the community. Registration is free but mandatory at: https://forms.gle/4yuQNomLVQ9xXnu29 or via the QR Code indicated on the event flyer.
Coordinated by Ana Marta Gonçalves, researcher at the Center for Marine and Environmental Sciences (MARE), Department of Life Sciences, FCTUC, the MENU project was developed over three years in partnership with the University of Aveiro and the companies Ernesto Morgado S.A. and Lusalgae.
MENU offers consumers a rich and healthy diet with high nutritional value, taking advantage of the various properties of marine macroalgae, e.g. antibacterial, antidiabetic, antioxidant and anticancer. What distinguishes this project is the complete use of macroalgae and not just extracts, as is the case in many industries.
“Macroalgae have many benefits for human health. Therefore, our bet was to use the algae as a whole, so that our products have all the bioproperties, guaranteeing the beneficial effects for the consumer”, says the project coordinator, Ana Marta Gonçalves.
This project was funded by the Blue Fund – a financial incentive mechanism of the Directorate-General for Maritime Policy to support scientific research – and also aimed to respond to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the UN Agenda 2030, contributing to the production and consumption of sustainable products and improving nutrition.