Processing of Cereal grains

• Cereal grains belong to the monocotyledonous

family, Gramineae or Grass family.
• Cereals are the cheapest source of food energy
and protein content and constitute the bulk of the
food consumed by humans.
• The principal cereal grains are Rice, Wheat,
Maize(corn), Sorghum(jowar), Millets, Barley, Oats
and Rye. Of these rice and wheat are the chief
cereals of the human diet.
 Structure of Cereal grains
• The seed comprises of seed coat, germ and endosperm. Grains
of rice, barley and oats have, in addition fused palea and
lemma which constitute the husk outside the fruit coat.
• Each of the main parts of the grain – pericarp, seed coat, germ
and endosperm is further divided into various layers, tissues
and regions.
1. Pericarp
2. Seed coat
3. Aleurone
4. Endosperm
5. Embyro
 Composition of Cereal grains
• The chemical constituents of cereals are carbohydrates, proteins, lipids,
minerals and water, together with small quantities of vitamins, enzymes
and other substances.
1. Carbohydrates
2. Protein
3. Lipids
4. Minerals
5. Vitamins
6. Enzymes
7. Nutritive value
 Storage of Cereals
• The moisture content chiefly determines the extent of
deterioration. Temperature, supply of oxygen, characteristics of
the grain and infestation with moulds and insects also contribute
to deterioration.
• Cereal grains, although stored in dormant state, continue to
respire producing heat, water and CO₂. This facilitates the growth
of moulds which are invariably present in the grain. The growth
of moulds produces many enzymes that cause chemical
deterioration of grains.
• A moisture content of less than 14% is considered safe for the
storage of cereals. Therefore the cereal grains should be dried by
appropriate methods.
 1. Wheat
• Wheat belongs to the genus Triticum and there are over 3000
species.
• The principal wheat of commerce are the common or bread
wheat (T. aestivum); marcaroni wheat (T. durum) and club
wheat (T. compactum).
• Most of the wheat grown in India is the bread and macaroni
varieties.
• Wheat grains are ovoid in shape, rounded at both ends.
• Wheat contains 8-17% moisture, 63-71% starch, 2-3% protein,
8-15% crude fibre, 1.5-2.0% fat and 1.5-2% ash
• Wheat contains significant amount of Fe, P, Mg, Mn, Cu and Zn. The
mineral constituents are distributed mainly in the outer layers and
embryo of kernel.
• Wheat is a good source of thiamine and niacin, but poor in
riboflavin. Other members of vitamin B are present in small
quantities.
• Amongst carbohydrates, particularly all of the starch is in the
endosperm, while the soluble sugars are mostly found in the germ.
• The proteins of wheat may be divided into 2 major groups – the
non-gluten protein albumins and globulins, and gluten proteins.
Gluten proteins are rich in glutamic acid, mainly as glutamine and
proline. The non-gluten proteins contain high amounts of lysine,
arginine and tryptophan.
 Milling of Wheat
• Wheat is consumed mostly in the form of flour obtained by
milling the grain while a small quantity is converted into
breakfast foods, such as wheat flakes, puffed wheat and
shredded wheat.
• The traditional procedure for milling wheat in India has been
stone grinding to obtain whole meal flour. This method
results in 90-95% extraction rate of flour which retains
almost all nutrients.
• In modern milling, wheat is subjected to number of steps of
processing.
Steps in milling of wheat:
• Cleaning
• Conditioning
• Milling
 Cleaning

To remove other
To remove adhered
unattached impurities in
impurities
form of particles

Separation methods
By washing or dry
based on size, shape,
scouring terminal velocity, specific
gravity, magnetic and
electrostatic properties,
colour, roughness.
2. Conditioning:
• This improves the physical state of the grain for milling and improves
the baking quality of milled flour.
• It involves adjustment of moisture content.
• Once the moisture content is optimum(15-17%), the bran is
toughened and separation of endosperm becomes easy.
3. Milling :
• Cleaned and Conditioned wheat is subjected ti milling to separate the
endosperm from bran and germ, and to reduce the endosperm to flour
fineness to obtain the maximum extraction of white flour from the wheat.
The reduced endosperm is known as flour.
• Flour milling is achieved by grinding in roller mills. Grinding is carried out
in 4-5 stages, i.e., in gradual reduction process. Each grinding stage gives a
mixture of coarse, medium and fine particles. Later all the particles are
separated for different purposes.
• Wheat is generally ground into whole meal (atta), semolina (suji/rava) and
flour (maida)
• Finer divisions include high gluten and low gluten atta, high, medium and
low gluten maida.
 Wheat flour
• Wheat flour obtained at different stages of the gradual
reduction process differ in terms of the proportion of the
endosperm, bran and germ.
• Flours of desired quality can be obtained by different
processes.
1. Bleaching: Flour contains yellow pigment (Xanthophyll)
which is not desired in white bread making. So the flour
is bleached by oxidation. The chemicals used for
bleaching include Chlorine, Chlorine dioxide, benzoyl
peroxide and acetone peroxide.
2. Maturing :
• The bread making quality of freshly milled flour improves with storage for
1-2 months. The change occurs more rapidly if the flour is exposed to the
action of air. During such aerated storage enzymatic changed occur.
• Fats are first hydrolysed by lipases to fatty acids which are then oxidized
by lipoxygenase. Due to action of reductases, disulphide bonds decrease
in number and sulphydryl groups increase. These changes are known as
Maturing or Ageing.
• Like bleaching, chemical substances or ‘improvers’ accelerate maturation.
Improvers like Potassium bromate, Potassium persulphate, ascorbic acid,
azodicarbonamide are used.
 Wheat Products
1. Wheat flour:
• Maximum amount of today’s consumption is wheat
flour. It is either white (bran and endosperm removed)
or brown (containing bran and endosperm).
• The flour is known as ‘strong’ if it has high gluten
content and ‘soft’ if the gluten content is low. Strong
flour, being high in gluten forms a certain toughness
that holds its shape well when baked. Soft flour
results in finer texture and used into cake flour.
2. Pasta:
• It is a type of food made from the flour of various grains, water and
sometimes eggs, which is mixed, kneaded and formed into various shapes
and boiled prior to consumption.
• While the name comes from Italy, it is widely consumed all over the
world.
• Less frequently, the term maccheroni is used for the same products,
especially when in combination with cheese.
• Dried Italian style pasta is made from durum wheat semolina, which gives
it a yellow color and a slightly chewy texture.
• Pasta is made either by extrusion where the ingredients are forced
through holes in a plate known as die, or by lamination, in which dough is
kneaded, folded, rolled to thickness then cut by slitters.
3. Macaroni:
• Macaroni is a corruption of Italian word
maccherone ant its plural maccheroni.
• It is typically machine-made dry commercial pasta,
used in contrast to fresh pasta made at home.
• Macaroni technically should not contain eggs.
4. Wheat bread:
• Popular food in western countries.
• It is often made from wheat flour dough that is cultured with
yeast, allowed to rise and finally baked in oven.
• Owing to it high levels of gluten, common wheat is the most
common grain used for the preparation of bread.
5. Semolina:
• Semolina is coarsely ground grain, usually wheat, with particles mostly
between 0.25-0.75 mm in diameter.
• The same milling grade is sometimes called farina, or grits if made from
maize.
• It refers to two different products: semolina for porridge is usually steel-cut
soft common wheat whereas ‘durum semolina’ used for pasta is coarsely
ground from either durum wheat or hard wheat.
• Semolina pudding is made by boiling or baking the grain with milk and
sweetners. The pudding can be flavoured with vanilla, served with jam.
• In Italy spaghetti made from semolina are called pici. In most of India, it is
known as sooji, in southern India as rava.
6. Wheat beer:
• Beer that is brewed with a significant proportion of
malted wheat.
• Addition of wheat lends beer a light flavour and pale
colour.
• Wheat beers are brewed using both ale and lager
brewing techniques.
• The 2 most common wheat beer varieties are Belgium
Witbier and German Weizenbier.
7. Wheat gluten:
• Also called seitan, wheat meat or simply gluten made
from gluten of wheat.
• It is made by washing dough made from wheat flour in
water until starch is rinsed away, leaving only gluten,
which can be cooked and processed in various ways
• Some types may taste even more like meat than tofu due
to their chewy/ string texture.
8. Wheat bran flakes:
• It is breakfast cereal containing 100% US recommended Dietary
Allowance of 11 Vitamins and minerals- Vit B1, B3, B5, B6, B12,
C, E and Fe, Riboflavin, Folic acid and Zn.
• It is a condensed source of insoluble fibre and hence helps
prevent constipation and keep bowel movements regular.
• Rich in prebiotics
• May promote heart health.
 2. Rice
• Rice (Oryza sativa) probably originated in South-Asia. 90% of
world area under cultivation is in Asia.
• It grows in swamps, under water. Grows below sea level in
plains.
• There are different varieties of rice suited for growth under
different environmental conditions. It is estimated that there
are over 1,00,000 different varieties all over world.
• In India, thousands of rice varieties are cultivated depending
upon colour, length, breadth, smell and nature of starch.
Structure:
• Rice grain resembles wheat but is smaller than wheat, is
flattened laterally and has no ventral furrow.
• The pericarp accounts 6%, starchy endosperm 91.75%
and 2.25 % is germ layer of the rice grains.
• The aleurone layer is generally thicker in japonica
variety of rice than in the indica rices.
• The endosperm is of 2 kinds, the glutinous and the non-
glutinous.
Composition:
• The composition of Indian rice is 10.9-13.8 % moisture, 5.5 - 9.3 %
proteins, 73.4 - 80.8 % carbohydrates, 0.2-1.0 % fibre and 0.8-2.0 %
mineral matter.
• The major carbohydrate of rice is starch (72-75 %). The amylase content of
the starch varies according to the grain type, the longer grained and
superior types contains 17.5 % amylose.
• Rice also contains some free sugars like glucose, sucrose and dextrin.
• The protein content of rice is lower than that of wheat. A glutelin is the
principal protein of rice. Rice proteins are more rich in arginine compared
to other grains.
• In its mineral content, most of the minerals are present
in the pericarp and germ. The Phosphorous content is
high, about 4%.
• A number of enzymes, present in rice, include amylases,
proteases, lipases, oxidases, peroxidases and phenolase.
The activity of alpha-amylase in fresh rice is probably
responsible for its sticky consistency after cooking.
• The pigments of coloured rice are the anthocyanins and
carotenoids.
• In India the ‘basmati’ rice is highly esteemed for its
peculiar aroma.
Processing of Rice:
1. Parboiling:
• Parboiling is particularly good in the case of coarse and medium rice
of soft structure, because such rice suffer excessive breakage when
milled raw.
• Parboiling involves soaking paddy in water for a short time followed
by heating once or twice in steam and drying before milling.
• It has number of advantages; Dehusking of parboiled rice is easy and
the grain becomes tougher resulting in reduced losses during milling.
• The nutritive value of rice increases after parboiling because the
water dissolves the vitamins and minerals present in hulls and bran
coat.
• Thus, valuable nutrients which would otherwise be lost with
busks and bran in rice milling are retained by endosperm. The
parboiled rice will not result into glutinous mass when cooked.
• A number of methods are used for parboiling of rice. In one
method, wet paddy is held in vessel under reduced pressure for
some time, then steeped in water at 75°C-85°C for 2-3 hours
under pressure, the steeping water is drained off and the paddy
is heated under reduced pressure for a short time with live steam
in a steam-jacketed vessel. The product is then dried.
• In another method(Malek process), paddy is soaked in water at
30°C for 4-6 hours, steamed under pressure for 15 min and dried.
The product is called Malekized rice.
2. Milling:
• Milling of rice consists of cleaning to remove small and large
heavy impurities, dehulling and milling – a process which
removes the coarse outer layers of bran and germ.
• Paddy in India is milled either by home pounding or in
mechanized rice mills. Home pounding is done by using a
mortar-pestle. Winnowing is done to remove the husk/hulls.
Home pounded rice has a short storage life owing to higher
possibility of rancidity.
• In modern milling, rice is passed through two stone or
rubber discs rotating at different speeds and by shearing
action on the grain, the hull is pulled away.
• The whole kernel from which the hulls have been removed is
known as ‘brown’ rice. This is then milled in a machine called a
paerler to remove coarse outer layers of bran and germ by
process of rubbing, resulting in unpolished milled rice. There is
always certain amount of breakage of rice in this milling.
• Unpolished rice is liable to develop rancidity and so it is next
polished in a brush machine, which removes the aleurone layer
and yields ‘polished rice’.
• Sometimes the polished rice is further treated in a device called
trumbol, to give a coating of sugar and talc to produce a brighter
shine on the grains.
• Polishing of rice also done by Solvent extraction milling (SEM)
Cooking and nutritive value:
• Freshly harvested rice has poor cooking qualities, when compared to
paddy stored for a few months after harvest.
• Freshly harvested rice has low swelling capacity and causes digestive
disorders.
• Washing of rice before cooking results in loss of B – Vitamins. Over
60% of thiamine is lost during washing.
• Continuous use of polished rice leads to beri-beri, deficiency of
Thiamine.
• Cooking time on average should be 35-45 min.
• Quick-cooking rice takes 2-15 mins. They are precooked by dry
heating.
Rice products:
1. Rice flour:
• Contains 9-13 % moisture content, 5-9 % protein, 0.4-1.0 %
fat.
• Used in refrigerated biscuit manufacture to prevent
sticking, in baby foods as thickeners and in waffle and
pancakes as a water absorbent.
• Used in preparation of vermicelli, papad and curls.
• The protein content of rice flour can be increased upto 26%
and can be used as an substitute for milk for children over 1
year old.
2. Parched rice:
• Parched rice is a crisp product with a greyish to brilliant
white colour.
• About 4-5% of rice in India is converted into rice
products- parched rice, parched paddy and rice flakes.
• It is prepared by throwing rice in sand heated earthen
pot. On stirring the rice starts to crackle and swell. The
contents are removed and sieved to separate the parched
rice from sand.
3. Parched paddy (Puffed rice)
• Sun dried paddy is filled in earthen jars and is moistened
with hot water. After 2-3 minutes, the water is decanted and
the jars are kept in inverted position for 8-10 hours.
• Then paddy is exposed to sun for a short time and then
parched in hot sand like the parched rice.
• During parching the grains swell and burst into a soft white
product. The parched grains are sieved to remove sand and
winnowed to separate husk.
4. Flaked rice:
• It is made from parboiled rice. Paddy is soaked in water for 2 -3 days
to soften the kernel, followed by boiling in water for a few min.
• After cooking, the water is drained off, and the paddy is heated in a
shallow earthen vessel or iron pan, till the husks break open, after
which it is pounded by a wooden pestle, which flattens the rice kernel
and removes the husk.
Byproducts of rice:
• Rice bran
• Rice bran oil
• Rice polishings
• Husk
Types of Rice:
• Wild rice
• Brown rice
• Black rice
• New rice for Africa (NERICA) – crossing O. glaberrima and O. sativa
• Glutinous rice
• Basmati rice
• Patna rice
 Maize
• Maize (Zea mays) known as corn has high % of
carbohydrates, lipid and protein. Maize is used for the
manufacture of starch, sugar, syrup, industrial alcohol and
alcoholic beverages.
• The principal maize varieties are
• Flint corn: very hard kernels
• Dent corn: endosperm contains soft starch
• Sweet corn: large proportion of carb’s as kernel as dextrin
and sugar
• Pop corn: major part of endosperm is hard starch, with
small portion of soft starch. When the corn is popped the
endosperm expands with the formation of fluffy white
irregular mass.
• Flour corn: grain of this type are large and soft and the
endosperm is very friable. Hence easy grinding is
permitted.
• Waxy corn: contains high proportion of amylopectin.
 Structure and composition:
• Maize is much larger than other cereal grains. Maize may be white,
yellow or reddish in colour.
• The average composition of maize is 14.9% moisture, 11% protein,
3.6% fat, 66.2% carb’s, 1.5% minerals.
• Starch(66-74%) is predominant carbohydrate of maize. Amylose
content is about 27%. Cellulose and hemicellulose are the principal
constituents of maize hulls.
• Various proteins like albumin, globulin, glutelin are present.
• Major lipids of oil of maize are triglycerides. Triglycerides have high
proportion of oleic acid and linoleic acids.
• Maize is a good source of phosphorous and Fe. But low in Ca. Also
deficient of niacin(B3).
 Milling
• Milled by dry as well as wet processes. In both processes
germ is separated from grain in order to extract and recover
germ oil.
• In dry milling, grains are cleaned and conditioned by addition
of cold or hot water, which results in loosening of bran and
germ. The conditioned grain is passed through a suitable
machine to separate bran and germ. The stock after
degermination is dried to 15% moisture content and then
sifted to produce number of fractions.
• The fractions are milled in roller mills. All the finished grits,
meal and flour are sifted.
• Maize is wet milled to obtain starch, oil, feed and the products of starch
hydrolysis.
• The first step in wet milling is steeping. The cleaned maize is steeped for 48
hours in warm water(50°C) containing sulphur dioxide. Steeping in water
softens and assists separation of hull, germ and fibre from each other.
• After steeping the water is drained off, and the maize is coarsely ground in
degerminating mills to free the germ from the grain.
• The germ is then separated, dried and oil extracted by hydraulic pressing or
by using a suitable solvent.
• The degerminated material is then finely ground.
• The suspension of starch and protein from wet screening is adjusted to a
specific gravity of 1.04 by dewatering over string filters and the starch is
separated from protein by continuous centrifugation.