Chapter Twenty - The influences of different cold storage environments on the mechanical and physiological quality of stored amadumbe (Colocasia esculenta L. Schott)

Abstract

Amadumbe (Colocasia esculenta L. Schott) is an edible underutilized crop non-climatic root crop grown in South Africa. The tuber is grown by small-scale farmers that have recently entered the retail market. However, there is no information on the recommended optimum storage conditions. However, the impact of uncontrolled storage conditions on maintaining the quality attributes of amadumbe still needs to be elucidated. This study was carried out to determine the effects of different storage conditions on quality attributes. The amadumbe cultivar (Dumbe-Dumbe) was stored in five different storage conditions, namely, Treatment I (TI), ambient storage as control, Treatment II (TII), underground storage, Treatment III (TIII), CoolBot and evaporative cooler, Treatment IV (TIV), high-cold storage, and Treatment V (TV), low-cold storage. The corms were stored in three replications using a completely randomized block design and sampling was done every 14days for a period of 70days. The data was analysed using Duncan’s multiple range test with GenStat 18.2.1 software. Storage conditions had a significant (P<.01) impact in increasing the fresh weight loss (FWL) and toughness, and a significant impact in reducing the shear force, and cutting energy. TIV reduced the weight loss of amadumbe by 8% compared to TI. TIV and TII were able to reduce the hardness of amadumbe by more than 10% compared to TI. Storage period had an impact in increasing the FWL (0%–18%), hardness (14.2–18.68N), toughness (71.3–84.5Ns), dry matter content (27.6%–36.9%), specific gravity (1.0–1.2) and a significant impact in the reduction of shear force (18.6–12.7Ng−1) and cutting energy (82.9–39.9Ns). Despite TIV preserving the quality attributes better than all other storage conditions, to preserve the quality of amadumbe for longer durations at an affordable price, it is recommended that the microenvironment inside the evaporative cooler be improved by lowering the temperature to 10°C.