Parboiled Rice

Content

 What is parboiling – introduction

 History
 Relevance in the different cultures
 Markets - Facts and figures
 Process
 Introduction
Parboiled rice (also called converted rice) is rice that has
been partially boiled in the husk.

The rice obtained from milling pretreated paddy is known

as parboiled rice whereas rice obtained from milling of
untreated paddy is known as raw rice or white rice.
 Introduction

Milling of paddy without any pretreatment is highly

susceptible to breakage and loss of minerals and vitamins.

To reduce breakage and loss of minerals and vitamins,

pretreatment known as parboiling was developed.

About 50% of the world’s paddy production is parboiled. The

treatment is practiced in many parts of the world such as India,
Bangladesh, Pakistan, Myanmar, Malaysia, Nepal, Sri Lanka,
Guinea, South Africa, Italy, Spain, Nigeria, Thailand, Switzerland,
USA and France.[
 History

• More than 1000 years ago parboiling was done in simple clay
pots in the earth to improve “shelf life” and the resistance against
insects.
• Only in this century parboiling has been developed from a farm or
village activity to an industrial process.
• Franco Gariboldi from Italy has experimented in his own rice mill
and invented several processes to gelatinize rice.
• He was active in promoting his technology as advisor to the FAO.
• The technology was then picked up by various engineering
companies in the USA, Germany, India and others.

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Advantages of parboiling

Reduces grain breakage during milling and hence

higher head rice recovery.

Parboiled rice is nutritionally richer than raw rice.

During cooking there is less loss of solids in the gruel

than raw rice.

Bran from parboiled rice contains 25-30% oil as

compared to 15-20% from raw rice.

Next
 Graphical depiction of nutrition transfer

Raw paddy rice. Vitamins and minerals Put in a vacuum, rice To move these Parboiled rice
in the bran. loses all the air it nutrients into the carries 80% of the
carries within. In a kernel, hot steam nutrients of brown
following warm water and air pressure are rice.
bath the nutrients used, otherwise
become more soluble they would rinse out
and move out of the into the water.
bran.
Process

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Parboiling process

Parboiling of paddy is a hydrothermal process in

which there is gelatinization of starch.

The process of parboiling is carried out in three

steps:

 Soaking

 Steaming

 Drying

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 Parboiling of Paddy
Soaking of Paddy

Soaking of paddy is carried out by dipping in water.

Dipping in water at ambient temperature takes long
time (72 h) for soaking, making paddy susceptible to
development of micotoxins.

Hence, soaking at elevated temperature of water is

considered better. The soaking duration varies with water
temperature.
 Parboiling of Paddy
Soaking of Paddy
The following time-temperature combination is
considered optimum for soaking:
Time-temperature combination for soaking of paddy:

S. No. Temperature, °C Time, h

1 Water heated to 50°C and allowed to come 24
to ambient temperature
2 Water heated to 75°C and allowed to come 12
to ambient temperature
3 Maintained at 60°C 8
4 Maintained at 65°C 6
5 Maintained at 70°C 4
6 Maintained at 72°C 3.5
7 Steam at 0.5 atm. pressure 0.4
 Parboiling of Paddy

Steaming of paddy

Steaming is carried out to gelatinize starch.

Generally, saturated steam at a pressure of 1-5 kg/cm2

is used for steaming of soaked paddy.

Duration of steaming depends upon quantity of paddy.

For small batch, 2-3 min whereas for large batch (6-8
tonnes), 25-30 min of steaming is required.
 Parboiling of Paddy
Parboiling plants

Household parboiling unit

Industrial parboiling units

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 Parboiling of Paddy
Drying of paddy

Drying of parboiled paddy from 45-50% (db) to 14-

16% (db) needs to be done for proper milling and
storage.

Sun drying of paddy is generally practiced.

For uniform drying, it is important that paddy is

spread in 2-3 cm thickness layer and stirred at an
interval of half hour.

It is also important that paddy is dried in two passes

instead of continuous drying. In first pass, paddy
moisture content should be brought down to 18-
20% and rest in second pass.
 Parboiling of Paddy
CFTRI method of parboiling
Parboiling tank is filled with clean water and heated to about 85°C.

Paddy is dumped into hot water in tank for soaking. The temperature
of paddy-water mixture comes down to 70°C which is maintained
for 3-3.5 h.

After soaking, water is drained from tank and then exposed to steam
at a pressure of 4 kg/cm2 until husk starts splitting.

Steamed paddy is dried in multiple passes.

During parboiling, the water requirement is about 1.25 times the

weight of paddy and requirement of steam is about 200 kg/ton of
paddy.