Improvement of Quality of Composite Bread by Incorporating Dual Modified Traditional Rice Flour

Bakery industry is heavily depended on wheat flour due to its favorable properties. This dependency has proven disadvantageous for Bakery industry in countries where wheat cultivation is not possible. Rice flour with necessary modifications could be an ideal candidate to replace or used in combination with imported wheat flour in bakery industry. Traditional rice varieties suits best for obtaining flour since they nutritious and well adapted to the local setup. This study reports the impacts of physio-chemicals modifications of rice flour obtained from four traditional rice varieties grown in Sri Lanka in making of bread. Four traditional rice varieties namely Madatuwalu, Kaluhenati, Panchaperumal and Rathdal were selected and grains were soaked in 0.5M or 1M NaHCO3 solution for one hour followed by dehydration at 100oC for one to two hours. Functional properties of the modified rice flour such as, Water Solubility, Swelling Power and Water Absorption Index were determined. The treatments tested were shown significant effects (p < 0.05) on functional properties of all four flour types. Dipping in 1M NaHCO3 solution for one hour followed by dehydration for two hours at 100oC was the best treatment and Madathuwalu was the highest performing flour type for all the functional properties. Hence, Madathuwalu was selected after the application of best treatment to develop rice flour incorporated composite bread. The results showed that composite bread developed by substituting 40% wheat flour with modified rice flour resulted in the similar sensory attributes to bread developed with 100% commercial wheat flour.