Reconstituted Rice Grain Manufacturing Process
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current methods for enriching milled rice with vitamins and minerals are inefficient, resulting in poor visual appearance, irregular texture, and quick rancidity, failing to maintain optimal nutritional quality and consumer appeal.
Innovation Solution
A process involving a mixture of gluten-free cereal flour, preferably rice flour, with added nutritional and organoleptic substances, undergoes hydration and high-temperature heating to gelatinize starch, followed by compression and shaping to mimic natural rice grains, ensuring cohesion and uniform texture.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Quantity of substance
If milled rice is enriched with vitamins and minerals through coating, then nutritional quality is improved, but the coating dissolves during cooking and nutritional quality deteriorates
Solution Approach 1:
The invention incorporates vitamins and minerals into the rice grain structure during the reconstitution process before cooking occurs. The nutrients are mixed with rice flour and gelatinized starch to form a cohesive matrix that inherently contains the nutrients, rather than applying a coating afterward. This preliminary incorporation ensures nutrients remain stable throughout the cooking process.
Solution Approach 2:
The reconstituted rice grain is formed as a composite material where rice flour, gelatinized starch, water, and nutritional substances (vitamins and minerals) are combined into a unified structure. This composite approach integrates nutrients within the grain matrix itself, making them resistant to dissolution during cooking while maintaining the rice's functional properties.
2Quantity of substance
If reconstituted rice grains are produced with high nutritional content, then nutritional quality is improved, but visual appearance and texture become irregular and unattractive
Solution Approach 1:
The invention carefully controls critical parameters including heating temperature (above 100°C for gelatinization), water content (20-50%), and compression force during forming. By optimizing these parameters, the process produces reconstituted rice grains with smooth surfaces, uniform shape, and consistent texture that closely resemble natural rice, while maintaining high nutritional content from the incorporated vitamins and minerals.
Solution Approach 2:
The invention ensures uniform distribution of nutritional substances throughout the rice flour mixture before forming. The vitamins and minerals are evenly dispersed within the gelatinized starch matrix, creating consistent local quality throughout each grain. This uniform distribution prevents irregularities in both nutritional content and physical appearance across the entire product batch.
3Quantity of substance
If contact time between vitamins and minerals and rice grain is extended for better penetration, then nutritional quality is improved, but production time increases significantly
Solution Approach 1:
The invention utilizes the phase transition of starch during gelatinization (heating above 100°C in presence of water) to achieve rapid nutrient incorporation. The gelatinization process creates a cohesive, porous matrix that allows vitamins and minerals to be uniformly distributed throughout the grain structure within minutes, eliminating the need for extended contact times required by traditional diffusion-based enrichment methods.
Solution Approach 2:
The invention combines multiple functions into a single integrated process step: rice flour mixing, nutrient incorporation, hydration, gelatinization, and grain forming all occur in one continuous operation. This merging of steps achieves thorough nutrient penetration and uniform distribution without requiring separate, time-consuming contact phases, significantly reducing overall production time.
4Manufacturing precision
If reconstituted rice grains are produced to match natural rice appearance, then consumer appeal is improved, but manufacturing complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The invention employs a multi-functional extrusion forming device that simultaneously performs mixing, gelatinization, shaping, and surface finishing operations. This single apparatus produces reconstituted rice grains with natural-like appearance, smooth surfaces, and proper dimensional characteristics without requiring multiple separate processing steps or complex equipment assemblies, thereby managing manufacturing complexity while achieving high appearance quality.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
The process produces reconstituted rice grains with improved nutritional and organoleptic characteristics, identical appearance and texture to natural rice, and enhanced cooking behavior, while maintaining nutritional balance and consumer appeal.
Implementation Method 1
heating the mixture taking place at a temperature substantially higher than 100°C... to gelatinize starch, followed by compression and shaping
Data Source
AI summary
The invention relates to a reconstituted grain of rice obtained from a mixture comprising a flour composed of at least one gluten-free cereal, said reconstituted grain of rice being characterized in that it comprises at least one food substance that has a nutritional and/or organoleptic function, in that it has an appearance substantially identical to that of a natural grain of rice and a substantially smooth outer surface. Treatment of grains of rice.