Traditional Fruits & Vegetables

Preservation Methods

Fruits & Vegetables Processing & Packaging 384.1.0
3
rd
Year II
nd
Semester



CHARINDU MAKAWITA
AS 2008708
AS 60409
(2007/2008)
BSc. (Spec)






Department of Food Science & Technology
University of Sri Jayewardenepura
Fruits & Vegetables Processing & Packaging

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Introduction
Fruit & vegetable are an important supplement to the human diet as they provide the
essential minerals and vitamins and fibre requires for maintaining health. As almost all the
fruit & vegetables are perishable and seasonal shelf life of the fruit & vegetable is very short.
Therefore in order to increase the shelf life while reducing the post harvest losses & to
reduce economic losses, preservation of fruit & vegetable is very important.
Since ancient time people are used to preserve food to consume when the time which lack
of food due annual climatic changes. By experience they knew that if they can reduce the
moisture content of the fruit & vegetable they can increase the shelf life of the produce. As
well as they knew that if they can reduce water activity which microbes can utilized for their
metabolic activity (free water) they can increase the keeping time of the fruit & vegetable.
Base of these assumption they discovered various method to preserve their produce as they
can utilize them by increasing the shelf life of them. Those preservation techniques
practiced by our ancient people are being followed by present generation as well.
Those preservation techniques which practices traditionally have been list out & describe
below.
1. Drying (sun drying & shade drying)
2. Salting
3. Store under the dry sand or soil
4. Add vinegar
5. Smoking
6. In treacle
Drying
Drying is done by various methods. They are sun drying, shade drying, keeping at Atuwa
or Massa. Main objective of the drying is to reduce the moisture content of the produce in
order to minimize the amount of free water available for the microbes for their metabolic
activities. So they cant grow & decay the produce. Dried produce can be kept few mouths.
Quality & the shelf life are depending on the drying & storage conditions.
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Sinhala aborigines (Wedda) used not to be preserve food because consume food which are
abounded in each season. They only preserve chili & mushroom from sun drying.
Most of the dried produce is stores in Massa or Atuwa. Because in these places humidity
is very low due to Massa is located few feet Above the hearth in kitchen while Atuwa
located at just below the roof.
There is an additional advantage of storing dried produced on Massa because wood burn
smoke release from the hearth contains poly phenol compounds which may have anti
microbial effects. Fruits & vegetables which preserve from drying are as below.
Sun drying
Mango
Billing
Jack fruit stripes
Bread fruit stripes
bitter gourd
brinjals
Chili
mushroom
Shade drying
Onion - just after harvesting whole onion plant drying in shady environment until
outer layer become brown in colour.
Drying @ Atuwa
Jack fruit
Bread fruit
Preserve in treacle
By preserving in treacle can reduce the water activity of the produce as well as atmospheric
gasses are not dissolving in treacle. So, microbial activity on food is very low when store in
treacle. Fruit & vegetable like Pea nut & Garlic are persevered by storing in treacle.
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Especially for pea nut before storing in treacle roasting using a pan is necessary to decrease
the moisture content of the pea nut.
Salting
Salting is also done by to reduce the water activity of the produce as well as due to adding
salt osmotic dehydration of the micro organism occur.
E.g.: -
Salted lime
Salted billing
After salting the lime it is necessary to drying pot which contain salted lime covering a mesh
under the sun light to increase the salt concentration by removing the water which coming
out after adding lime in to salt solution.
Pickling
Pickling, which uses salt and/or vinegar to inhibit the growth of bacteria, is one of the oldest
methods of food preservation. Cucumbers, sauerkraut, relishes and fruits can also be
pickled. Pickled foods will last anywhere from 3 months to a year. There are many recipes
and methods for pickling, but most include brining (soaking a food in a salt solution, similar
to marinating) for several hours or even days.
Store under the dry sand or soil
Dry sand or soil contain no free water for use for the microbes as well as very little amount
of atmospheric air move inside of the sand therefore produce are safe inside the sand or
soil. Lime & Jack sees are store under the sand. Due to very low moisture content & air
germination of jack seed in not undergo inside the sand. As well as shrinkage of the lime
does not occur under the sand.
Smoking
Traditionally smoking is done by storing of fruit & vegetables on Massa. Due to hot smoke
moisture evaporate from the produce and poly phenol compound present in smoke give
protection from the microbial attacks. As well as some chemical compound present in
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smoke increase the flavor profile of the fruit & vegetables. Jack & bread fruit stripes are
smoke after the drying under the sunlight. Pumpkin & ash pumpkin are also store at
Atuwa for smoking.
Store in vinegar
Onion, beans & kohila are store in vinegar known as Achcharu. Vinegar contains 4 % acetic
acid which reduces the pH of the medium. Reduce the acidity helps to preserve the produce
by inhibit the growth of bacteria in the medium. As well as vinegar give characteristic flavor
to the food.
Comparison between traditional preservation method vs. novel preservation
methods of preserving fruits & vegetables
In todays world there are lot of new preservation techniques have been found to preserve
fruit & vegetables. Following comparison is base on the advantages & disadvantages
between traditional & novel preservation techniques of fruits & vegetables.
When considering the economy of the preserving the produce traditional methods
are more cost effective. Because compare to the novel method most of the
traditional method consume free energy source like solar power as well as it does
not used specially designed machineries like ovens & druers and skilled employees.
As far as concern the quality of the preserve produce novel preservation methods
have high quality as those methods following by specially design packaging according
to the type of produced and while preserving they specially consider about the
quality aspects like avoiding contaminations, minimize the loss of nutritional
composition, preserving natural colour of the produce (dehydrated fruit &
vegetables), packaging, shelf life, final moisture content, storing temperature &
storing condition. But in traditional methods they are not that much considers about
the quality of the final product but only concern the preserve the produce for a
certain time. In traditional methods lots of contamination can occur. Some of them
are due to deposition of dust, pest & insect attack, microbial contamination as
expose to the sun light directly. As well as poor quality produces due to poor
packaging, poor storage conditions, lack of humidity control after drying, deposition
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of cancer causing chemical compound contain in smoke & wrong predictions about
shelf life of the produce.
In traditional drying methods, drying the produce uniformly is not possible always
while novel drying method ensure the drying the produce uniformly.
Novel preservation methods are comparatively faster than the novel methods.
Preservation of nutritional composition of the novel method is higher than the
traditional methods.
For some novel preservation methods preservatives like SMS & benzoic acid are
used. So, there may be some health effect due to novel methods compare to
traditional methods.
Novel methods preserve the colour of fruit & vegetables for a greater extend while
poor quality colour result from traditional methods.