Ethnic communities of North-East India consume various traditional beverages which are mostly
prepared by fermentation of rice of their own. Many ethnic communities reside in Assam, India and
the consumption of fermented drinks is always considered to be their culture and existence of the
ethnic tribes. In present work, eight different rice beer samples are collected from different parts of
Assam representing Ahom, Mising and Karbi community. The samples are characterized with respect
to various physico-chemical analysis and microbiological parameters. In present work, the
methodologies for the process of preparation of rice beers by different ethnic communities are also
carefully observed and properly documented. It has been observed that all the samples are acidic in
nature 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 varied
from 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 correlation
matrix study also shows a good positive correlation between conductance and TDS, hardness, free
CO2 and bicarbonate alkalinity. In this study, no coliform bacterial contamination appeared while the
colony forming unit ranged from 0.3 × 105 to 1.68 × 105 cfu mL-1.
PHYSICO-CHEMICAL AND ANATOMICAL ANALYSIS OF Bambusa assamica Barooah & Borthakur OF ASSAM AND NORTH-EAST INDIA.
