Design, development and performance evaluation of chapati press cum vermicelli extruder.

Portable and manually operated chapati press
cum vermicelli extruder device was designed and fabricated
for the preparation of chapatis and vermicelli. Sensory
evaluation overall quality scores of 50.15 and 48.4 for
pressed chapatis and rolled chapatis respectively showed
that quality of chapatis was not adversely affected as a
result of mechanical pressing. The difference in chapati
making time by manual rolling and machine pressing was
17 s per chapati and was statistically significant (p<0.05).
Combined machine produced more numbers of chapatis as
machine press time per chapati was 12 s compared to 29 s
of manual sheeting time. The observed variation in 1.5 mm
thickness and 173.8 mm diameter from chapati to chapati
was of the order of ±0.1 mm and 1.93 mm respectively.
Pressed chapati repeatability results indicated that there was
no significant difference in diameters of the samples.
Appearance quality characteristics scores of 8 and 7 for
2 mm and 3 mm diameter vermicelli respectively indicated
smooth and uniform surface characteristics. Sensory evaluation
of the cooked vermicelli indicated no significant
difference (p>0.05) between 2 mm and 3 mm diameter
vermicelli. Cooked weight (72.8 g) and water absorption
(191.2%) of 2 mm diameter vermicelli was more compared
to 3 mm diameter vermicelli (51.75 g, 107%). This machine
can also be used as a laboratory model as products of
consistent thickness and diameter were obtained.