Cereal Chem 62:437-440   |  VIEW ARTICLE
Noodles. III. Effects of Processing Variables on Quality Characteristics of Dry Noodles.

N. H. Oh, P. A. Seib, and D. S. Chung. Copyright 1985 by the American Association of Cereal Chemists, Inc. 

Response-surface methodology was used to examine the effects of five variables on the quality of oriental dry noodles. The variables were water absorption, dough pH, mixing time, roll speed, and reduction percentage in roll gap. The seven responses were color and breaking stress of uncooked noodles, and surface firmness, cutting stress, resistance to compression, cooked weight, and cooking loss of cooked noodles. The measure-of-fit indicated that variability in color, breaking stress, cutting stress, resistance to compression, and surface firmness were accounted for by two to four of the variables (R2 = 0.94-0.69) but variability in cooked weight and cooking loss were not. Water absorption and dough pH significantly affected the majority of quality characteristics of noodles, whereas roll speed and reduction percentage in roll gap affected the surface properties of cooked noodles. Mixing time was the least significant variable. The conditions most suitable for laboratory preparation of oriental dry noodles were: optimum absorption determined by the handling properties of sheeted dough, neutral dough pH, minimum mixing to form small spheres of dough (approximately 5 mm diameter) distributed uniformly in a continuous flour phase, 30% reduction in roll-gap setting, and a slow roll speed during sheeting.