Innovative Rice Noodles Made from Black Rice

For many people, this food product is known to have a width of 1 cm, flat surface, and white color. Its characteristics are elastic with a soft sensation in the mouth. Yes, it is a rice food product called kwetiau made from black rice. Through discussion with and support from her lecturers, Cindy Felicia Hardi was able to develop a variety of products using black rice as the main raw material. “Generally, I use corn starch, but in this research I use wheat starch. The addition of starch can help to improve the characteristics of kwetiau noodles because of the presence of amylose and amylopectin, which are parts of starch that have a different structure so that the characters produced are different,” said Cindy who is a Food Technology student from the Faculty of Agricultural Technology of Widya Mandala Catholic University of Surabaya.

Because it uses different main raw materials, of course the nutritional content in kwetiau noodles is different. The compound levels of fiber, protein, and antioxidant in the form of anthocyanins in black rice are rated higher than in white rice. To produce a variety of food products, Cindy took a total of five months to obtain the formula, texture and characteristics of rice that are acceptable to the test of most people. For this reason, Cindy tested 100 panelists to have them tried her noodles. When the results were obtained, kwetiau noodles with the addition of 10% wheat starch were shown to be the most preferred, especially for the elasticity and the preference for softness of kwetiau when inside the mouth in terms of organoleptics.

“If it is different in terms of its nutritional content, the taste produced is actually not too different. It’s just that there is a distinctive taste similar to when we consume black sticky rice. But this is not very influential,” said the Banjarmasin-born woman. Using black rice does not mean it comes without difficulties, in which the most difficult part was during the manufacturing process, mainly at the printing stage, because it was difficult to get a flat surface of the dough; and also at the steaming stage in order to keep the steaming temperature. In completing her thesis, Cindy was guided by Drs. Sutarjo Surjoseputro, MS., and Erni Setijawati, S.TP., MM.

Cindy who had joined the Student Executive Board organization at her department stated that her research can still be developed further, such as for example in terms of the storage and variation of materials that can be used. With the completion of her studies, Cindy also successfully achieved the Best Academic Graduate award and was inaugurated during the graduation ceremony of the 2017/2018 academic year – for the Odd Semester. The graduation ceremony was held on October 13, 2018.