Antioxidant activity of barley as affected by extrusion cooking

Grit from different hulled barley cultivars was subjected to extrusion cooking and the effect of extrusion moisture and temperature on the antioxidant properties was studied. A significant decrease in the total phenolic content (TPC) and total flavonoid content (TFC) was observed upon extrusion and a further decrease of 8–29% in TPC and 13–27% in TFC was observed when both the feed moisture and extrusion temperature were increased. The antioxidant activity (AOA) increased significantly upon extrusion and this increase was the highest (36–69%) at 150 °C and 20% feed moisture. The increase in feed moisture and temperature significantly increased the metal chelating activity. The reducing power decreased significantly upon extrusion as compared to their corresponding control samples. Extrusion lead to a greater increase in non-enzymatic browning (NEB) index however, increasing the moisture content of feed decreased the NEB index by 3–29% (at 180 °C) and 1–17% (150 °C), while increasing the temperature increased the NEB significantly.