Evaluation of Corn Grit Quality from Farmer-Scale Trial Production

Abstract

Corn grit is one of the corn products can be used as staple food for rice substitution in order to support food diversification program. This research conducted to identify the quality of corn products produced from the production trial at farmer level. Corn grit production trial was conducted at corn centre production area in Kupang-East Nusa Tenggara. The research was conducted in three stages: 1) milling process of corn, 2) corn grit processing, and 3) Identification of corn product quality, including aflatoxin content, moisture content, ash content, fat content, protein, carbohydrate, dietary fibre and organoleptic properties. Two types of corn used in this research were white and yellow corn. Corn grit processing was conducted to produce 3 types of corn grit that were original corn grit, parboiled corn grit and premium corn grit.The results showed that yellow corn had higher yield and milling capacity than white corn that was 86.44% and 19.43 kg grit/hour corn. Measurement of quality corn grit products showed that the parboiled corn had the highest total aflatoxin content of 17.08 ppb in white corn and 20.95 ppb for yellow corn, although the value was still below the safe threshold for consumption. Parboiled corn grit also showed the highest of carbohydrate content, protein content and total energy of 82.87%, 8.83% and 386.49 kcal on white corn; and 85.42%, 8.74% and 392.82 kcal on yellow corn. However, based on the preference test for colour parameters, flavour, aroma and overall appearance showed no significant difference between treatments.