Indian Journal of Agricultural Biochemistry

With rising interest for healthy and nutrient rich diet much attention is directed towards healthy functional foods. Millets have good nutritive potential compared to cereal grains but also have antinutritional factors making it less accessible. Major millets viz sorghum, pearl millets and finger millets were analyzed under three processing techniques of soaking, germination and natural fermentation for period of 12 hours, 24 hours, 48 hours and 72 hours. Study showed that sprouting and natural fermentation have maximum influence on the antioxidants and antinutritional factors. Comparative analysis of millets suggested 12 hours of soaking, 48 hours germination and 36 hours fermentation for finger millets, pearl millets and sorghum to be effective for producing nutritionally enriched millet beverages. Tannin content decreased with increase in germination. The reduction in tannin and phytic acid after soaking (12 hours) and germination (48 hours) was highest in finger millets (0.41 mg/g) and sorghum (0.168 mg/g), respectively. With natural fermentation the tannin and phytic acid contents were reduced maximum in finger millets (0.54 mg/g) and sorghum (0.51 mg/g), respectively. The spike in TPC and TFC was found to be maximum in finger millets ranging from 0.115 mg/g to 0.147 mg/g after germination and (0.057 mg/ g-0.14 mg/g) after fermentation, respectively. Study showed that prolonged sprouting of millets contained more antioxidants content. The dietary fibre and protein content increased ranging from 5.41%-6.74%, 27.11%-33.94% and 12.05%-18.25% by soaking, germination, and fermentation, respectively. An increase in micronutrients was observed after the processing treatments of millets. Further there was decrease in bulk density and increase in water absorption capacity of the millet samples after germination and fermentation. Hence it can be concluded that application of these techniques increased the nutrient availability for development of probiotic fermented beverages.