When to stop drying fruit: Insights from hygrothermal modelling

Abstract

Stopping the drying process prior to complete dehydration reduces energy consumption and processing time but can also improve product quality. Using hygrothermal simulations, different stopping criteria are evaluated, which are based on the final water activity and residual moisture content in the fruit. Their impact on drying time and moisture redistribution kinetics inside fruit is quantified. One of the variants leads to a significant reduction in residence time in the dryer (24%), compared to full dehydration. For this variant, drying is stopped when the average moisture content in the sample reaches the value corresponding to an equilibrium water activity of 60% in the sample, as determined from the sorption isotherm. At the same time, this variant does not induce problems with fruit spoilage, as a sufficiently low water activity is reached after moisture redistribution during relaxation in the ambient environment. In addition, the relation of the drying time to the drying air temperature was quantified for all stopping criteria, as well as the impact of the humidity of the ambient environment in which the dried fruits are placed afterwards. This study gives a better quantitative insight in when fruit drying should be stopped, given specific drying conditions, without having to compromise food safety.