Improvement of Traditional Parboiling Process

Abstract

Laboratory scale studies were conducted to improve the traditional parboiling process. Different steaming treatments were given to the paddy with a rice cooker under open and covered conditions. The energy consumption in parboiling, qualities of parboiled rice and the material temperature during pre-steaming, soaking and steaming were measured. The moisture content of parboiled paddy and hardness of parboiled brown rice at different steaming intervals were also measured for inside and surface layers. Faster rise of material temperature during pre-steaming and steaming, and slower material temperature drop during soaking were observed under the covered method. The hardness of parboiled brown rice was higher for the bottom layer than the surface layer and the covered method provided higher value with even less amount of energy being consumed compared to the open method. There is no difference in overall quality indices between two methods. The experimental results reveal that the traditional parboiling process can be improved to reduce energy consumption by adopting the covered method.