Microwave Drying of Enriched Mango Fruit Leather

Abstract

Mango fruit leather is becoming popular for their taste, chewy nature and nutritive value. A study was undertaken to find out the effect of incorporating of defatted soy flour to process nutritionally enriched mango leather with alphonso mango pulp(TSS 16 Brix) and defatted soy flour (protein 52%) with addition of sugar and lime juice . The different levels of incorporation such as 10, 15, 20 and 25 percentage were studied along with drying characteristics by using microwave drier. A 750W, 2450MHz microwave oven was used to dry the sample from 30 to 15 % moisture content at five different power levels (4, 8, 12, 16 and 20 W/g using 50g of sample) with power cycle of 30s on / 30s off. All combination of these variables was tested in triplicate. The dried fruit leather was evaluated for quality parameters viz., dehydration behavior, texture, colour, water activity and sensory properties. The results showed that mass reduction of the sample was rapid at higher microwave power level and drying time was very short (one minute) at higher power level whereas it was longer at lower power level. With increase in the soy flour concentrations at higher micro wave power level the colour values for lightness and yellowness increased. The water activity level was within the safer limit. The sensory evaluation showed that 10 to 15% of soy at microwave power level of 2 and 4 were highly significant in terms of colour, texture, flavour and taste.