Manufacture of Bagasse Powder Field of the Invention.

This invention is directed to a method to manufacture bagasse powder which has a multitude of uses including food and drink additives, cosmetic additives, a general filler and the like.

Background Art.

Bagasse is the waste plant fibre left after the juices have been removed from sugar cane. The bagasse is commonly burnt to provide the fuel source for the sugar mill and excess energy can be on sold. Other uses of bagasse are as mulch.

However, bagasse, being a plant fibre, may provide a source of dietary fibre. Dietary fibre is extremely important in a person's diets.

Bagasse also has plant components which may be useful as a nutritional supplement.

Attempts have been made to extract dietary fibre or other components from bagasse. However these have generally resulted in the formation of pulp which is not very useful as it is difficult to handle.

Other attempts have resulted in the formation of an extract solution which is also quite difficult to handle.

Basically, there are two types of useful fibres being insoluble fibres and soluble fibres. Insoluble fibres can be used as a bulking agent and many types of insoluble fibres are known in the marketplace.

Soluble fibre is extremely desirable as a food or drink additive. Currently, the main sources of soluble fibre are from chicory, vegetables, cocoa. The soluble fibre has desirable properties inside the intestine including the ability to absorb up to 15 times its own weight and fluids, fats, cholesterol and free radicals. It also appears that

soluble fibre can reduce the risk of cancers.

However, it has been difficult to produce large volumes of soluble fibres making the soluble fibres expensive to produce.

Soluble fibres are also useful when used together with insoluble fibres in certain food products due to the ability of the soluble fibre to absorb moisture and to prevent the food products from drying out.

Therefore, there would be an advantage if it were possible to provide a method to treat bagasse in such a manner that the end product, rather than being a pulp or a solution, is a dry flowable powder which is much easier to handle and finds greater range of applications in the marketplace.

It will be clearly understood that, if a prior art publication is referred to herein, this reference does not constitute an admission that the publication forms part of the common general knowledge in the art in Australia or in any other country.

Object of the Invention.

It is an object of the invention to provide a method for the manufacture of a bagasse powder.

In one form, the invention resides in a method to manufacture bagasse powder from bagasse, the method comprising subjecting bagasse to a steam treatment step, and converting the treated bagasse into a powder.

Suitably, the bagasse is treated to a steam pressure of about 15 atmospheres (220 psi) and at 200°C for a period of about 10 minutes.

However, the steam pressure may be higher or lower than the range given above, and may be between 5-30 atm, or may be at atmospheric pressure.

The temperature may be higher or lower than the range given above and may be between 100-500°C.

The treatment time may be higher or lower than the range given above and may be between 1-60 minutes.

The bagasse may be "raw" bagasse as obtained from a sugar mill. If desired, this initial bagasse may be pretreated by fluffing, further grinding, and the like.

While not wishing to be bound by theory, it is believed that the steam pressure and temperature treatment breaks down the cellulose structure in the bagasse making it more palatable as a food or drink additives and making the bagasse able to release more fibre and other elements of the bagasse.

Without the treatment, it is found that the extract obtained from the bagasse is not as palatable and does not release as many of the desired fibres (including dietary fibres) and other desirable elements of the bagasse. Therefore, use of untreated bagasse as a stock food has not been particularly useful as the fibres in the bagasse are strongly bonded together and do not readily breaks down. Therefore, untreated bagasse has a lower rate of digestion in cattle.

The formed bagasse powder has many uses. For instance, the powder can be steeped in hot water to release fibre and other trace elements which can be taken as is as a high fibre bagasse drink or tea or added to anything where high-fibre and low-fat plus trace elements is wanted.

The powder can be used as a food additive, as a health drink, as an additive to fruit drinks, milk drinks, soft drinks, food snacks, confectionery, biscuits, cakes, breads, health foods, used as a food expander, fibre additives to any food or beverage for human consumption, pet foods, pet health products, stockfeed, stock drinks, stock growth products, stock fattening products, an additive for cosmetics, shampoos, conditioners, skin treatments, lipsticks, face products, body and nail products, pharmacological uses, soil treatments, soil additives, fish pellets, fish foods, food for

poultry and birds, an additive for building products, various horticultural uses, and can even be used as a powder fuel additive fuel source. The product can also be used in alcoholic beverages such as liqueurs and wines. The product can also be added to hamburgers, bread, curry, rice and other foods to provide a large range of functional foods. The product can also be added to pottery as a filler.

Many of these above uses would be difficult if the extract was a pulp or a solution.

The particular treatment step to provide a bagasse powder increases the rate of the digestion of the bagasse probably because of the breakdown of the strong bagasse fibres into shorter fibres.

Tests show that untreated bagasse has a digestion rate (in animals) of about 18%, while the bagasse treated as above has a digestion rate of about 34%. Also, the soluble fibre increased from 4% to 19%.

hi one use, the raw bagasse can be subject to steam treatment at 15 arm, 200°C at 10 minutes and the treated product can be dried. The dried product can then be further crushed to form the powdered bagasse or can be used without further crushing as roughage in feed.

The powdered bagasse can be further treated if desired. For instance, the bagasse can be added to water, boiled and filtered to form a, or form part of a, bagasse tea, soft drinks, fruit juices, and other beverages.

Alternatively, the powdered bagasse can be used directly as a dietary fibre in a variety of food products including hamburgers, curry, rice, bread, rice crackers, biscuits, brand, salads, pet foods, and cooked foods.

The amount of powdered bagasse which is added can be between l%-90%, and preferably between 1-30%.

In an example, there is provided the following chemical composition of animal

feedstuffs.

The above table illustrates another advantage of the treated bagasse which is to lower amount of ash. To explain, too much ash is highly undesirable as a foodstuff additive especially for ruminant animals.

Best Mode.

hi an example, waste bagasse ( the by-product of sugar production after the sugar has been removed and typically from a sugar mill) is processed for 3 to 60 minutes and at 1 to 30 atm at between 110-400 ⁰ C. Under these process conditions, the bagasse was discoloured brown, a fragrant scent was emitted, and the bagasse fibre was broken down. The fibre could be collected and broadly classified into soluble fibre and insoluble fibre. Prior to treatment, the amount of soluble fibre (which is a desired product) was about 5% and after treatment, this had increased to about 52%.

The steam treatment can be carried out in an autoclave which is essentially a stainless steel cylinder with a door at one end designed to operate at a maximum pressure of 320 psi ( 14.7 psi is approx 1 atmosphere) with a built-in safety margin of 25% and to have a steam inlet and outlet valve and the safety pressure relief valves built into the autoclave and set at maximum operating pressure of 320 psi, with pressure gauges to

measure steam pressure in inlet line, outlet lines and in the autoclave itself, and with pressure and moisture bleed of valves in the back end of the pressure system and the temperature gauge to measure the internal temperature.

The autoclave is preheated to 150° centigrade and bagasse is placed inside the stainless steel cage and the door is shut. The steam outlet valve is closed and the steam inlet valve is opened to bring steam up to the desired pressure. The outlet valve is then opened to allow steam flow through the bagasse at a desired temperature and pressure. A timer can be started and the cooking time commences with the cooking time dependent on the steam heat and the pressure. After the cooking time has finished, the steam inlet valve is closed and the pressure bleed of valve is opened and the autoclave door is opened at the exact same time intervals to ensure that consistency of cooking is maintained.

A cooking time range is between 2-20 minutes with optimum time being 5-15 minutes.

Figure 1 illustrates the relationship between temperature and pressure.

The treated bagasse is removed from the autoclave and placed in a fluid bed drier. The treated bagasse is dried for eight hours or less to prevent release of sugars and other volatiles starting the fermentation process and rendering the bagasse unsuitable for use. The bagasse is dried to between 5-10% wet weight and removed from the drier.

The dried bagasse is placed in a mill or granulator and ground down to the commercial size desired.

A desired particle size range is given in Figure 2

The bagasse powder can therefore have a particle size of less than 20 μ up to about 200 μ with the majority of the particles having a size of between 40-160 μ.

The bagasse extract which contains the soluble fibre can be extracted by immersing it in boiling water or alcohol followed by evaporation and, if necessary, drying and grinding to provide a powder.

To produce a soluble fibre in solution, the bagasse powder is steeped in tepid water and then the temperature is raised to just below boiling for about 10 minutes. The solution is filtered to remove excess powder and the filtered solution contains soluble fibre.

The dryer may comprise an autoclave which may be of known design. The apparatus may comprise a stainless steel hopper fitted with a mesh screen mounted in the hopper. Below the screen is a hot air inlet providing the drying source. An electric vibrator motor is attached to the hopper which is mounted on air inflated vibration dampers. A direct drive centrifugal fan exits to a duct expansion which leads to a cross-section box containing electrical heating elements. Following the heating box, a duct reduction feeds to the hopper inlet.

It is also found that the treatment process breaks down the fibre into various different types of saccharides and acids which may have medicinal properties.

In another example, "raw" bagasse was treated at 115 arm and 203 ⁰ C for 10 minutes and further treated to provide a powder. 25O g of the powder was added 3 L of water and the solution was boiled for 10 minutes and filtered and the extract was extracted. The bagasse extract was diluted twice to form a drink. The drink was sampled by 80 people and 94% reported that the drink was pleasant and suitable as a beverage.

hi another example, soft drinks with a colour similar to tea can be obtained by using the bagasse extract as described above, and adding sugar. A taste test showed almost 100% acceptability of the soft drink..

hi another example, powdered bagasse was placed into a coffee filter together with coffee and boiling water was poured on to the composition. The resultant beverage was taste tested and was found to be suitable as a drink.

hi another example, 5 g of bagasse powder was added to 1 L of an alcoholic beverage (awamori - is an alcoholic beverage indigenous to and unique to Okinawa, Japan. It is distilled from rice, not brewed. It is similar to sake (an alcoholic beverage from mainland Japan), but made from Indica instead of Japonica rice), taste tests showed the composition to be suitable as a blended alcoholic beverage.

hi another example, bagasse powder was added to water, boiled and extracted and used as a topical application (instead of a bath). 83% of patients found the topical application to provide desirable benefits including an improvement in adverse dermatitis conditions.

In another example, a bagasse extract as described previously was used as a drink after meals and 80% of patients found that the drink reduced stomach complaints including gastritis.

Throughout the specification and the claims (if present), unless the context requires otherwise, the term "comprise", or variations such as "comprises" or "comprising", will be understood to apply the inclusion of the stated integer or group of integers but not the exclusion of any other integer or group of integers.

Throughout the specification and claims (if present), unless the context requires otherwise, the term "substantially" or "about" will be understood to not be limited to the value for the range qualified by the terms.

Any embodiment of the invention is meant to be illustrative only and is not meant to be limiting to the invention . Therefore, it should be appreciated that various other changes and modifications can be made to any embodiment described without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention.