Assessment of Traditional Rice Beer Quality Manufactured by Different Ethnic Tribes of Assam, India

Ethnic communities of North-East India consume various traditional beverages which are mostlyprepared by fermentation of rice of their own. Many ethnic communities reside in Assam, India andthe consumption of fermented drinks is always considered to be their culture and existence of theethnic tribes. In present work, eight different rice beer samples are collected from different parts ofAssam representing Ahom, Mising and Karbi community. The samples are characterized with respectto various physico-chemical analysis and microbiological parameters. In present work, themethodologies for the process of preparation of rice beers by different ethnic communities are alsocarefully observed and properly documented. It has been observed that all the samples are acidic innature and the pH values are ranged from 2.83-5.05, while conductance ranged from 0.028-1.86 ms/cm.The amount of free carbon dioxide varies from 0.105 g/L to 6.81g/L. The amount of hardness variedfrom 0.012 g/L to 0.38 g/L. The sugar content of various rice beers ranged from below detection limit(BDL) to 4.4 g/100 mL while the percentage of ethanol varies from 2.2 to 5.7 g/100 mL. The correlationmatrix study also shows a good positive correlation between conductance and TDS, hardness, freeCO2 and bicarbonate alkalinity. In this study, no coliform bacterial contamination appeared while thecolony forming unit ranged from 0.3 × 105 to 1.68 × 105 cfu mL-1.