Samuel Johnson’s dictionary defined Oats as “eaten by people in Scotland, only for horses in England”. A Scotsman’s retort to this is “That is why England has such good horses and Scotland has such fine men”. Ironically, oats have now become one of the most demanding and healthy staples throughout the world. Oats has got a greater history associated with the mankind. It was eaten as early as the Neolithic and Bronze ages. The Romans cultivated it. Some Used it to make gruel.
The processing of Oats like any other cereal is an important and necessary part, as unprocessed oats does not digest readily. The main process here is milling. Milling breaks and removes the outer coat/ husk of the oats and makes the oat into groat. The global market of oats is witnessing an enormous growth since last decade and is expected to grow even better in the coming decades. The main reason behind its growth is obviously, it is nutritional and dietary properties.
Know Your Oats
Oats (Avena Sativa) thrive in cold climates, and it has a noticeably short growing season. It was most prevalent in mid and eastern Europe, until the mid-1800s. It is an annual grass like wheat and barley. Oats are generally categorised based on their sowing period: i.e., Spring oats and Winter Oats. Oats love cool summer temperatures and plentiful rain to sprout out and grow. Hence, there is no surprise in the beautiful oat flowers bloomed across Scotland, all year round.
Market of Oats
Oats had a global market worth 4.90 billion USD in 2018 alone. And this market is estimated to have a compounded annual growth rate of 5.5% in 2020-25. The main reason for its growth is obviously it’s nutritional and dietary values. Currently, oats rank seventh in the global production of cereals. They are internationally used as consumer foods, cosmetics and personal care, animal feeds etc. The need for a quick and nutritious breakfast in the rapid urbanisation period has pumped the velocity of it’s market growth.
The increasing urge for healthy baked foods, cookies, cakes etc, are one of the main factors that has stimulated it’s target market. Oats has also got an increasing demand in cosmetic and personal care manufacture.
Why Oats?
They are rich in protein, minerals, dietary fibre, vitamins, and carbohydrates. They also have plenty of antioxidants and they do help immensely on people suffering from chronic lifestyle diseases, such as diabetes, cardio-vascular diseases, and cancer.
Market segmentation of oats
Processing of Oats
Cereal grains are evolutionarily designed to be inert, making it a strong biological tissue to store it’s nutrients intact until the germination. Hence, unprocessed cereals are not readily digestible. So, they must be processed well to convert them into palatable and nutritious food. As human beings are clever looters, we have developed techniques centuries before to extract the stored food from the seed.
The outer part of seed, i.e., the hull or husk is so efficient that, if the seed is consumed un-processed, it can pass through the entire digestive system with little or no digestion at all. It is one of the wonders of the world which helped the dispersion of plants throughout the globe. Milling and other processes thus becomes crucial for the conversion of seed to food. Processing also optimises flavour, colour, texture and enhances the shelf life.
This article further reviews on various processes involved in the oat processing. It is to be noted that it can vary from mill to mill, region to region etc. So here we discuss the processes on a broader perspective.
Milling
Arrival of oats from farmers starts of the milling process. There are many quality checks to be done at the reception point to ensure good quality end product. They are tested for weight, moisture, foreign materials, insects, taints, and odours. Any parameter outside the satisfactory result will lead to rejection.
1. Reception and Cleaning
The oats supplied by the tankers are received and stored in Silos. It is then transferred to the initial sifts or sieves accordingly. Sieves are used to remove the contaminants. They are incorporated with wire mesh whereby; oats are sieved through a rotary motion. They are also passed through a rotary magnet, colour sorter and de stoner to remove metals, discoloured oats, and stone/glass, respectively.
2. Dehulling
The husk is flavourless and is not readily palatable. Hence, dehulling is one of the crucial steps in oats processing. Dehulling occurs at an impact huller in industry, rather than the stone hullers. Oats are fed through a spout into the impact huller which consists of an inner rubber ring.
There is a rotating disk inside it which spins approximately at an RPM of 1850. The disk throws oat grains on the rubber ring, hence removing the hull. The hulls are then removed by aspiration. The resultant groats are polished to remove further remaining of the hull in it. The hulls so removed are used for many by products.
3. Kilning
Kilning is a process done to destroy the enzyme systems that can attack the lipid profile of oats, which can cause rancidity. During this process, oats are heated to 80-150oC for 90-120 minutes.
Kilning also reduces the moisture content of groats below 13% and helps in developing flavour. After kilning oats are either sent to be flaked or sent to be steel cut prior to being flaked.
4. Steel Cutting
Steel cutting involves cutting of the groat, usually done by a stationary knife within a rotary drum, thus making it ready for further flaking. It is either done or not done according to the final product characteristic.
5. Steaming, Flaking and Cooling
Primary steaming is done to condition the groats for flaking. It aids the oats in minimum breakage and complete enzyme inactivation. It is then passed between two rollers with a diameter typical of the flake size required for the product. Intact groats produce rolls in the region of 0.5-.08 mm, whereas cut groats allow thinner flakes to be produced (0.25-0.45 mm)
Following the flaking, oats are passed to the cooler and the temperature is brought down to 45oC. This allows the product to be packed and ensures acceptable shelf life.
Oats is a remarkably nutritious food with an excellent lipid profile and high amounts of dietary fibre. The global rise in increasing demand in nutritious foods has pumped up the pace of the growth of processed oats business. Milling is crucial in oats processing as the oat kernel is largely indigestible. Now, that you are aware of the benefits and processing of oats, go get some oats, prepare, and have an oatmeal, and stay healthy and positive in this pandemic.
References
1. http://www.madehow.com/Volume-5/Oatmeal.html
2. https://archive.gramene.org/species/avena/oat_intro.html
3. https://www.marketdataforecast.com/market-reports/oats-market
4. https://www.fortunebusinessinsights.com/industry-reports/oats-market-100199
5. https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1028&context=nutritionfacpub
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