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Potential of pearl millet in food processing
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Thursday, 02 March, 2023, 14 : 00 PM [IST]
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Shiva Chauhan, Richa Saxena & Dr Mamta Thakur
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After rice, wheat, maize, barley, and sorghum, pearl millet (Pennisetum glaucum) is the sixth most significant cereal crop. It is a member of the "Poaceae" family and is also known by a variety of other names, including Grano (Spanish), Bajra (Hindi), Kamboo (Tamil and Malayalam), Bajri (Marathi, Gujarati), and Bajra (Bengali, Punjabi, Urdu). Its origin place is Africa. Most of the world's tropical semi-arid regions in Africa and Asia are where pearl millet is farmed. Its potential to be grown in areas where wheat, maize, and other cereal crops fail to thrive is further increased by its capacity to survive in drought and hot climates.
The low soil fertility and high salinity are also resistive to pearl millet. In the grain of pearl millet, there are 75% endosperm, 17% germ, and 8% bran. The proportion of pearl millet germ is around twice that of sorghum, which shows that the grain of pearl millet contributes more to the nutritional content. In Asia and Africa, where 30 million hectares of land are used to cultivate it, pearl millet provides a staple food for 90 million underprivileged people.
India produces the most pearl millet in the world, with a total production area of 9.8 million hectares. Due to its health-promoting qualities, pearl millet is particularly advantageous for persons with disorders including diabetes, obesity, diabetic heart diseases, and metabolic diseases.
Nutritional Value
When compared to other cereal crops like wheat, rice, maize, and sorghum, pearl millet has a deeper root system that allows it to take more minerals from the soil and has a better nutritional value. Moreover, pearl millet has great nutrition and is a good source of macronutrients like iron and zinc. More protein (14.0%), fat (5.7%), fibre (2.0%), and ash (2.1%) are present in it than in the most widely grown cereal crops.
This crop is particularly beneficial to humans because to its superior protein quality in terms of tryptophan and threonine content as well as higher concentration of calcium, iron, and zinc. It has more folates (8%), magnesium (18%), thiamine (15%), niacin (14%), riboflavin (11%) and pyridoxine (11%), and it has 201 kcal of calories. It is also gluten-free and a respectable source of fibre. High levels of antioxidants, polyphenols, and phytochemicals, all of which are proven to support human health in a variety of ways, can be found in pearl millet. Frequent use of pearl millet as part of a healthy diet may help prevent nutrient deficits.
Health Benefits
Because the grain has relatively little gluten, pearl millet is regarded as a nutritious cereal food crop. As a result, pearl millet may show to be a practical low-cost substitute for those who are celiac, have non-celiac gluten sensitivity, are gluten sensitivity patients, or are food style enthusiasts. Due to the proliferative qualities connected to the presence of phenolic extracts, pearl millet has the ability to avoid carcinogenic effects.
Pearl millet eases constipation, lowers cholesterol, improves vision and eye health, and aids in reducing insulin resistance in diabetics. Compared to rice, wheat, and sorghum, it is an anti-diabetic cereal grain crop because of its low glycemic index and slow digestion capacity brought on by its higher fibre content. In vitro, the fibres in pearl millet grains have a prebiotic effect, causing probiotic cultures like Lactobacillus rhamnosus and Bifidobacterium bifidus to proliferate. It is full of antioxidants and beneficial for weight watchers. Its flour is beneficial for the heart, controls blood pressure, prevents anaemia, increases bodily endurance, and strengthens bones.
Pearl Millet processing
After being dehusked, pearl millet is ingested and prepared similarly to how rice is. At the household level, a variety of traditional food processing and preparation techniques are accessible, such as soaking, blanching, decorticating, hydrothermal processing, germination, fermentation, or combining treatments and adding taste enhancers. It can be made into flour, salted ready-to-eat grains for thick and thin porridges, and confectionery.
It can also be roasted, popped, sprouted, and processed into flour. The taste, nutritional value, and product selection are all improved by processing pearl millet. Moreover, processing improves the bioavailability and digestibility of additional minerals while reducing anti-nutritional elements. Other processing techniques should be used with caution because they shorten the shelf life of pearl millet due to its high fat content. The grain works well for making malt as well. Its malted seeds can be used to make a booze.
The use of pearl millet in the creation of gruel, composite flour, cookies, cakes, biscuits, nankhatai, muffins, namkeen sev, matar, ladoo, popped ladoo, dhokla mix, idli mix, chapati mix, pasta, extruded products, ready-to-eat snack mix, rabadi, dumplings, and milk-based beverages has been demonstrated in several research work. Pearl millets are also used to make a number of traditional dishes, including bhakri, suhali, khichri, churma, shakkarpala, popped grain, dalia, and chapathi. Scientists have also developed a variety of pearl millet-based diabetic food compositions by parboiling them.
Koozh, a fermented beverage made from rice and pearl or finger millet, is a favourite among people in India's southern states. Pearl millet-based fermented beverages are becoming more popular on the market. Some of the common products of Africa include alcoholic beverages such opaque beer, chibuku shake, mbeg, and merissa as well as non-alcoholic beverages like boza, marewa, mahewu, pombe, pito, kunun zaki, bushera, and oskikundu. In India, it is also used to make flour for bread and as animal feed. Moreover, it lowers cholesterol and aids in digestive problems.
Problems with pearl millets
Pearl millet can grow in a variety of ecological situations with low precipitation and relative humidity, but there are still some difficulties that act as a barrier to pearl millet production. In Asia and Africa, "downy mildew" or "green ear" causes great damage to pearl millet.
The illness is transmitted through the soil and is brought on by the fungus Sclerospora graminicola, which causes the longitudinal shredding of the leaves and the browning of leaf streaks. Although pearl millet has many health advantages, it also includes antinutrient chemicals that prevent or impair the body's ability to absorb other nutrients, which may result in shortages.
One of these substances, phytic acid, prevents the absorption of potassium, calcium, iron, zinc, and magnesium. Moreover, the millet includes trypsin inhibitors, phenols, tannins, and dietary fibre, which function as "antinutrients" by chelating minerals. By building complexes with proteins and blocking enzymes, these substances are associated with a decrease in protein digestibility.
Moreover, the presence of polyphenolic pigments in the pericarp, alurone, and endosperm regions may result in the development of an unappealing grey colour and flavour in the finished product.
The occurrence of lipase activity in the pericarp, aleurone layer, and germ of grains is primarily responsible for the development of off flavours and aromas in flour and its products. Reduced anti-nutritional factors can be achieved by adopting a variety of processing procedures, including as dehulling, milling, malting, blanching, parboiling, acid and heat treatments, to increase the shelf life of pearl millet flour as well as processed products.
There are several major issues with pearl millet that have been limiting its consumption, including inadequate investments in product development and commercial ratio, low social status of small millet food, resistance to dietary fibre, and lack of knowledge on the use of pearl millet in the daily diet.
Future scope of pearl millets
The Food and Agriculture Organisation will celebrate 2023 as "The International Year of Millets" to encourage the use of all millets, especially pearl millets, which highlights the significance of pearl millet. Pearl millets can be used to create a variety of baked goods, milk products, and beverages.
Adding pearl millet to food formulations can also enhance or fortify the nutritional content of finished goods. Further research should be done in order to better understand the potential of all the pearl millets cultivars grown in the nation as well as the development of new cultivars that are intriguing for grain production and food nutrition.
Studies on the effects of various food preparation methods, the development of a variety of products, sensory evaluation, grain and flour lipid stability, and clinical essays taking into account Indian diets where hypoglycemic and goitrogenic effects would be researched should all be taken into account.
(Chauhan belongs to Department of Food Technology, School of Sciences, ITM University, Gwalior; Saxena belongs to Department of Food Technology, School of Sciences, ITM University, Gwalior; Dr Thakur belongs to Department of Food Technology, School of Sciences, ITM University, Gwalior. They can be reached at mamtathakur.sos@itmuniversity.ac.in)
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