AbstractMillets are nowadays finding important place in human diet due to their better nutrient composition. The objective of this study was to analyze the nutritional and anti-nutritional biochemical parameters from the raw and malted seeds of eight different finger millet (Eleusine coracana L. Gaertn) genotypes and to evaluate the effect of malting on the nutritional and anti-nutritional parameters. Eight different genotypes were collected from two different locations Jorhat and Gossaigaon of Assam. Thirteen parameters viz. moisture, crude protein, crude fat, crude fibre, total ash, total carbohydrates, starch, reducing sugars, total phenols, phytic acid and minerals such as calcium, iron and zinc were studied. The results of raw finger millet seeds showed a moisture content range of 9.37-10.57%, crude protein 8.36-9.88%, crude fat 1.14-1.71%, crude fibre 2.98-3.58%, 2.09-2.49% total ash, 73.37-75.60% total carbohydrates, 63.10-65.02% starch and 0.37-0.49% reducing sugar. Furthermore the genotype had calcium contents ranging from 295.5-308.7mg/100g, iron 9.62-15.51mg/100g and 1.86-2.52mg/ 100g zinc. The total phenol and antinutrient phytic acid contents in raw seeds were found to be in the range of 1.01g GAE/ 100g to 1.60g GAE/100g and from 0.42g/100g to 0.61g/100g, respectively. The seeds were malted for 96 hours which showed increased content of moisture 11.90-12.64%, 8.63-10.10% crude protein and 3.21-5.22% reducing sugar whereas decreased content of crude fat 0.80-1.38%, 2.78-3.25% crude fibre, 1.86-2.23% total ash, 71.31-73.03% total carbohydrates, 46.69-51.83% starch. Also, there is a reduction of minerals (calcium, iron and zinc) and total phenol content in malted seeds. The antinutrient phytic acid also got reduced in malted seeds and varied between 0.18 and 0.27g/100g.
Bharath et al. (Wed,) studied this question.