Cereal Processing

Cereal processing is a multiplex operation containing series of unit operations to convert cereals into easily digestible and consumable products such as flour, dhal, grits, or any further processed products.

- D. A. Patel, B. L. Jani B. M. Devani

INTRODUCTION

Popular cereals like wheat, rice, corn, rye, oats, barley, sorghum and some of the millets like pearl millet, finger millet, proso millet, etc have filled up our dish with myriad of food products and are very versatile and reliable source of food. Cereals are low cost energy food with good shelf life. Normally, cereals are used as flour or in pure form. Cereal processing is a multiplex operation containing series of unit operations to convert cereals into easily digestible and consumable products such as flour, dhal, grits, or any further processed products. Different cereals follow little different processing depending upon the end products and their characteristics such as physical and biochemical properties and market demand.

PRIMARY PROCESSING OF CEREALS

Cereals are processed after harvesting to make them suitable for longer storage, edible uses and for processing into value added products. After harvesting cereals undergo primary processing such as cleaning, grading, sorting for separation of foreign and unwanted matters, quality based grading and separation. Drying for safe storage and milling to remove outer layer or husk to make it edible are also important unit operations. Relatively low temperature and high air flowrates are effective in reducing the moisture content and not fissuring the grains. Drying conditions may affect the milling quality of the grains. Generally, field drying is carried out reduce the moisture but it is time consuming, weather dependent and unhygienic process resulting loss in quality of grains. Modern and mechanical drying processes are available to dry the grains in safe and hygienic controlled conditions producing uniformly dried product. The dried grains are stored until required for secondary processing.

MILLING