Quality aspects of pepino dulce fruits in distinct ripening stages, packaging forms and storage conditions

Neide Botrel,Raphael Augusto De Castro E Melo

doi:10.1590/1981-6723.30018

Neide Botrel, Raphael Augusto De Castro E Melo

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1590/1981-6723.30018

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Abstract

Abstract Pepino dulce (Solanum muricatum Aiton) or Pepino has been growing to produce edible, juicy and attractive fruits. The imported fruits and national small scale of Pepino dulce production are currently stored and commercialized under the absence of postharvest handling recommendations. Therefore, this work aimed to evaluate the quality aspects of Pepino dulce fruits in distinct ripening stages, forms of packaging and conditions of storage. The trial was conducted in a 2x2x2 factorial scheme - 2 ripening stages (ripe and immature) x 2 forms of packaging (with and without wrapping in plastic film) x 2 conditions of storage (room: 25 °C ± 2 ºC and 57% ± 5% of relative humidity (RH); cold: under refrigeration 10 °C ± 2 °C and 85% ± 5% of RH) – in a complete randomized block design. Fruit quality attributes, such as vitamin C, chemical and phenolic content, fruit color (mesocarp), firmness, dry matter content, total titratable acidity (TA), total soluble solids and pH, were evaluated. Fruits showed a centesimal composition with low calories and a significant content of potassium (K), phosphorus (P) and magnesium (Mg), which can contribute to the daily supply of these elements. For commercialization purposes, the association of packaging (plastic wrapping film) and refrigerated storage (cold: 10 °C ± 2 °C and 85% ± 5% of RH) to maintain the characteristics of fruit quality after a 15 days period is more important than its individual use.

Highlights

Pepino dulce (Solanum muricatum Aiton) is a species that was considered important in the Andean region, even before the arrival of European colonizers
Fruits presented a high content of water (92%) and low calories (24.50 kcal/100 g)
These results are in accordance to Viñals & Martinez (1996) containing 92.4% of water content, 0.4% of protein and 25 kcal 100 g-1 (Table 1), this way, classifying Pepino dulce as a low-calorie fruit with a high hydric content

Summary

Introduction

Pepino dulce (Solanum muricatum Aiton) is a species that was considered important in the Andean region, even before the arrival of European colonizers. In Brazil, this species is named muricato or Andean melon, and this plant can be found mainly in home orchards located in the south and southwest region, being consumed and offered in street/farmers markets as an unconventional or traditional vegetable (Melo et al, 2017; Globo Rural, 2017) This worldwide interest in this species generated a considerable amount of technical and scientific data on phenology, fruit composition (Herraiz et al, 2015, 2016; Mateos, 2015), among other important characteristics. This work had the objective of evaluating quality aspects of Pepino dulce fruits in distinct ripening stages, forms of packaging and conditions of storage

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