Question

Name some traditional Indian foods made of wheat, rice and Bengal gram (or their products) which involve the use of microbes.

Answer 1

Hint:- Microbes are present everywhere on the earth's atmosphere in soil, water, air, inside our bodies and that of other animals and plants. They are present at sites even where no other life-form could ever possibly exist. e.g., deep inside the geysers (thermal vents) where the temperature may be as high as 100°C, deep in the soil, under the layers of snow several meters thick and in highly acidic environments.

Complete answer:
Microbes belong to diverse groups of organisms like bacteria, fungi, protozoa, and microscopic plants. Viruses, viroids and prions (proteinaceous infectious agents) are also included among microbes.
While microbes are causal agents of most of the infectious diseases, they are also useful to humans in many important processes at home, industries, agriculture and sewage treatment.
Microbes perform a great role in daily activities. As bread is made up of rice and wheat and dosa and idli is made up of Bengal gram.
Bread: Bread is made up of dough, and that dough is fermented using Baker's yeast(Saccharomyces cerevisiae). The dough is made up of rice and wheat.
Puffed-up and fluffy appearance of dough is due to production of $\mathop {CO}\nolimits_2$, during fermentation. $\mathop {CO}\nolimits_2$ gas along with ethyl alcohol evaporate during baking, making bread porous and soft.
Swelling of dough during bread making is known as leavening. It is caused by secretion of three enzymes by yeast-Amylase, Maltase and Zymase
Dosa and Idli: The fermentation of rice and black gram is done by using bacteria which helps in preparation of Dosa and idli
Microbe used - Leuconostoc and Streptococcus species of bacteria.
Additional information:-
There are other foods also which are prepared by using microbes
cheese: it is one of the oldest food items in which microbes were used. It partially degrades the concentration of milk fat and casein.
Different varieties of cheese are known by their characteristic texture, flavour and taste, the specificity determined by the microbes used. For example, large holed Swiss Cheese ripened with the help of bacterium called Propionibacterium sharmmani.
Roquefort cheese is ripened by fungi Penicillium roqueforti.
Camembert cheese is ripened by Penicillium camemberti.

Note:- In industry, microbes are used to synthesise a number of products valuable to human beings like beverages and antibiotics. Production on an industrial scale, requires growing microbes in very large vessels called fermenters.