Hot air puffing machine performance evaluation and study of small millet properties

Abstract

Traditionally, puffing has been used to improve organoleptic qualities, extend shelf life, and make it easier to incorporate into ready-to-eat dishes. With longer shelf life and no contamination, oil-free RTE millet foods are more popular among the health-conscious population. Analyzing the physical and engineering characteristics of small millets allowed for the development of an electrically powered hot air puffing machine (HAPM), which addresses the hygienic problems with the current LPG-driven hot air and sand-puffing machine. Since the developed puffing machine was found user-friendly and safe to operate, it was evaluated for its performance against finger millet and found that its performance at 300 ºC puffing air temperature agrees with the optimized process conditions (19% initial grain moisture and salt solution pre-treatment) for the finger millet (GPU-66) in previously published data. Besides, the puffed product was accepted with a good score during sensory evaluation.