Effects of Blanching Methods on Drying Kinetics of Oyster Mushroom

Abstract

Oyster mushroom was treated with hot water and steam blanching prior to drying in cabinet dryer. A hot air cabinet dryer was used for drying mushroom at 40, 50, 60, 70 and 80°C temperatures. Solid loss was observed to be 25.46% and 3.32% (wb) during hot water and steam blanching, respectively. Highest drying rate was observed for hot water blanched mushroom followed by unblanched and steam blanched mushroom. This leads to more drying time for the steam blanched mushroom followed by the unblanched and hot water blanched mushroom for the same level of drying. The drying data was modeled for exponential and Page's drying model. Page's model was found to be better than the exponential model for the prediction of drying rate. The value of the model parameters of the exponential model was found to be higher than that of Page's model. The effective moisture diffusivity (De) was determined at different temperatures and found to be maximum for the hot water blanched mushroom and minimum for the steam blanched mushroom. The effective moisture diffusivity (De) increased with increase in temperature. The activation energy of hot water blanched, unblanched and steam blanched mushroom was estimated to be 25.324, 17.113 and 21.165 kJ/mol, respectively.