Memoirs of the Department of Agriculture in India. Bakhar:-The Indian Rice Beer Ferment

4 of the Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal containing an account of the manufacture and use of bdkhar in the Cuttack District and of the author's experimental work aimed at determining the source of fermenting power of this prepartion and the conditions necessary for its successful use ; the author arrives. [...] the second point of difference from the"144 THE INDIAN RICE BEER FERMEINIT Bengal method is either due to an error of observation on the part of the compiler of the report very likely to occur or implies the presence of the necessary infecting mould and yeast spores either in the materials used or in the air of the house where manufacture was carried on. [...] Even if the moulds present in bcikhar were able to produce the necessary alcoholic fermentation the amount and quality of this would vary very much in accordance with the composition of the micro-organic content of the cake used thus increasing the uncertainty of the action of the latter. [...] As will be seen from the figures given in the following experiments made to determine the relative saccharifying power of the various amylo ferments150 THE INDIAN RICE BEER FERMENT in pure culture the diastasic action of these fungi is largely influenced by the proportions of air and water present an excess of moisture being more prjudicial in the case of the Aspagillus than in that of the M [...] The Khasi women who carried out the making of the bdkhar and the preparation of the rice prophesied the failure of the brew from the cake without leaf and probably suspected some surreptitious addition as responsible for the actual result.