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Extrusion Processing of Rice-Based Breakfast Cereals Enhanced with Tocopherol from a Chinese Medical Plant

¹Department of Food Nutrition, Chung Hwa College of Medical Technology, 717 Tainan, Taiwan. ²Department of Food Science, National Chung Hsing University, 402 Taichung, Taiwan. Present address: Department of Biotechnology, Van Nung Institute Technology, Chung Li, Tao Yuan, Taiwan. ³Corresponding author. Fax: 886-4-2287-6211, E-mail: slu@cc.vit.edu.tw.

Brown rice flour was mixed with a Chinese medical plant (Euryale ferox Salisb.) and processed to make ready-to-eat breakfast cereals using twin-screw extrusion. Levels of 15 and 20% feed moisture in flour, and 200 and 250 rpm screw speed were set, and the physicochemical properties and content of α-, β-, γ-, and δ-tocopherols were determined. The data showed that 15% feed moisture gave a low bulk density and water absorption index but a high expansion ratio and water solubility index. High screw speed (250 rpm) produced a result similar to that of 15% feed moisture. A sample with 85% brown rice flour with 15% E. ferox Salisb. retained the highest content of α-, β-, γ-, and δ-tocopherols (125, 6, 78, and 9 μg/g), respectively. The optimum extrusion conditions determined were 15% E. ferox Salisb. mixed with brown rice at 15% feed moisture and at 250 rpm screw speed.