Wet-milling is an industrial process used for the separation of the main components from different grains by means of physical, chemical, biochemical and mechanical operations. Currently, this process is used in the industry for corn and wheat, but it could also be successfully applied for other cereals, like sorghum, barley, oats or rice. Fractions obtained during wet separation may find wider applications in food and nonfood products. However, the conventional process is still a very capital-and energy-consuming process; therefore, search is underway for alternative methods.
PRACTICAL APPLICATIONSNew ingredients derived from plants that would be useful in food and nonfood applications are still looked after. Wet-milling process is an easy method for separating the main fractions from various plants. Today, it is used at a large scale only for corn and wheat. However, there are many publications in which this separation method is applied, e.g., for rice, sorghum, oat, barley and some pseudocereals.