The Effect of Drum Dryer Temperature and Rotational Speed on the Characteristics of Finger Millet (Eleusine coracana) Based Weaning Food Enriched with Composite Flour

Finger millet or red millet is a source of carbohydrates, protein, and phytonutrients that have not been widely used. This has the potential to be used as an ingredient in making bread and porridge. However, the protein content of millet is insufficient for infant feeding and deficient in essential amino acids like lysine, so other ingredients are needed. This study contrasted composite flour dried at various temperatures and rotational speeds with millet-based supplementary feeding. Finger millet flour, red bean, skimmed milk powder, sugar, and salt were used to produce the weaning meal in that sequence. The dough-to-water ratio is 1 : 4. Organoleptic, physical, and chemical interactions were all considered. The experiment used a randomised block design with three replications and a 3 × 3 factorial pattern. The study discovered that drum dryer temperature impacted chemical, physical, and sensory responses (p <0.05). Temperature had a more significant influence on moisture content than rotational speed. Temperature above 120 °C results in lower moisture content at rotation higher than 1.0 min−1 and meets the criteria for instant porridge (lower than 4%). Lower moisture content at higher temperatures leads to increased protein concentration, but carbohydrates and fats remain relatively constant. The samples more preferred by the panellists were samples processed at higher temperature with rotation above 1.0 min−1. So, this value is recommended, apart from fulfilling the standard criteria, processing with higher rotational speed can increase the output capacity of the process.