Improving nutrition through ethanol

Food scientists want to enlist a corn ethanol byproduct commonly used as cattle feed in the fight against world hunger.

South Dakota State University researchers have been cooking up versions of Asian flatbreads that are higher in protein and fiber by substituting dried distillers grains for up to 20 percent of the flour.

Food science Professor Padu Krishnan said the naan and chapati breads that he and graduate student Sowmya Arra have been making could help people in developing countries boost their fiber and protein intake.

“We have a shot at feeding the world,” said Krishnan, a cereal chemist. “Right now, the world is hungry for useful proteins, and they don’t have meat sources.”

Chapati is an unleavened whole wheat flatbread common in parts of Asia. Naan, a white flour-based flatbread popular in Afghanistan, India and Pakistan, has a pizza crust-like feel.

Switching out 10 percent of the flour in chapati with food-grade distillers grains boosts the bread’s fiber content from 2.9 percent to 7.8 percent and the protein from 10.5 to 12.9 percent. A 20-percent mix in the dough increases the fiber to 10.3 percent and the protein to 15.3 percent, the research found.

Read the full article at Bloomberg Businessweek