Abstract
We investigated the influence of various types of salt containing different ingredients on the characteristics of cooked rice and its taste.
Both the swelling value and solubility of rice starch were highest in cooked rice without added salt and the cooked rice without added salt showed the highest water absorption on heating and coloring by iodine, and there was a tendency for these characteristcs to decrease when salt was added to the rice to be cooked.
The creep characteristics of cooked rice were analyzed with the six-factor Voigt model. Both the instantaneous elasticity and stable viscosity were higher for cooked rices with salt added, the highest value being recorded for cooked rice with NaCl added. The strain recovery rate was larger and permanent strain was smaller in the salt-added cooked rice than in the cooked rice without added salt.
The samples cooked with table salt and natural salt were preferred in sensory characteristics to those without salt.
An X-ray microanalysis of the inorganic elements revealed that they were initially localized on the outer surface of the uncooked rice, and that they migrated inside the rice when it was cooked.
