Quality Evaluation of Processed Products of some Peach Varieties

Abstract

The peach tree is among one of the most valuable species cultivated both in Romania and abroad, being very much appreciated for the quality of its fruit, both fresh and processed. The peach tree provides fresh fruit a large period (June-November). This allows for a rhythmical and prolonged supply with fresh fruit of the factories that process fruits. This paper has as purpose the establishing of the viability for processing into stewed fruit, comfiture, jam and nectar of nine varieties of peach: Catherine, Mimi, Southland, Narajnai ramai, Royal vee, Filip, Redhaven, Raluca and Collins. The peaches, provided from experimental plots of Research Station for Fruit Growing Constanta, were processed in micro production laboratory of Research Institute for Processing of the Horticultural Products, Bucharest. The sensorial analysis of the product was carried out according to the STAS 12656-88, which establishes the analysis methods with unitary scales of points (method A), methods used in the evaluation of the organoleptic characteristics of alimentary products. These methods are applied in order to appreciate a set of organoleptic properties: aspect, colour, taste, texture or consistence. Among the nine varieties of fruits peach was highlighting the variety Narajnai ramai, which recieved maximum score (20.00 points) for comfiture and jam and a total average score of 19.88 for stewed fruits and 19.77 for nectar. This variety, together with the varieties Mimi and Catherine obtained the score “very good” for all four types of canned analyzed: comfiture, jam, compote and nectar. The worse results were obtained by the variety Collins, which is less suitable for processing. After organoleptic testing, it received the score “good” for products comfiture and jam and the score “satisfactory” for products nectar and stewed fruits. The results presented in this research work showed that the organoleptic characteristics of fresh fruits influences much the quality of processed products, but not always from the best fresh peach are obtained the best processed product, the viability for processing being a variety characteristic. Â