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The instant controlled pressure drop (DIC) technology as a manufacturing

process of high quality snacks and expanded granule powders of onion and
super-fruits

Article · August 2009

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 314 MOUNIR Sabah, ALBITAR Nsren, and ALLAF Karim; The instant controlled
pressure drop (DIC) technology as a manufacturing process of high quality snacks
and expanded granule powders of onion and super-fruits; 5th International
Technical Symposium on Food Processing, Monitoring Technology in Bioprocesses
and Food Quality Management; Aug 31st to Sept 2nd, 2009 Potsdam, Germany
(Poster and communication); 2009.

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 The instant controlled pressure drop (DIC) technology as a manufacturing process
of high quality snacks and expanded granule powders of super-fruits.
1 1,2 1
Nsren ALBITAR , Sabah MOUNIR , Karim ALLAF
1. University of La Rochelle; Transport Phenomena and Instantaneity in Agro-industry and Building. Avenue Michel
Crepeau, 17042 La Rochelle Cedex 01 ; kallaf@univ-lr.fr Phone: +33 546 45 87 66.
2. Zagazig University, Faculty of agriculture, Egypt

Abstract
Swell drying of various foodstuffs, that is, hot air drying of such products at low initial temperature
between room temperature and 40 – 60 °C followed by DIC steaming for 20 – 30 seconds, instantaneously
dropping the pressure towards vacuum 5000 Pa and final drying and grinding, gives snacks (before grinding)
and expanded granule powder with quality attributes higher than normal dried or spray dried powders. In
the case of super fruits, the expansion rate is high, as well as the porosity and the specific surface area.
Total drying time is reduced by at least 50%. The process saves about 40% energy and can be easily
adopted by primary processors in developing countries. The final snacks as well as the expanded granule
powders have been sensory, functionally and structurally evaluated and found “perfect”. The product is
completely decontaminated and its nutritional value is somewhat partially preserved or even improved.
Key Words: Cranberry, specific surface area, expansion rate, porosity, texture, flavonoids.
Introduction surface area needed for acceptable functional
behaviours may imply too fine granules (D<50 µm)
Drying is one of the most effective ancient food
[14-16]. Such a powder don’t flow easily and as air
preservation methods. Its principle is based on
is trapped between agglomerated fine granules, it
removing water through evaporation or
induces a poor effective diffusivity slowing down
sublimation, purposing of decreasing the water
mass transfer and acts as barrier during the drying
activity of food to induce a longer shelf life [11-
operation. Moreover these agglomerated aerated
12]. In the case of sensitive products as super
fine granules also lead to be a barrier during
fruits, the drying temperature and time are the
rehydration, resisting water movement into the
factors who define the main quality vectors such
whole powder. Thus considerable time and
as colour, texture, convenience, as well as the
mechanical energy are required in wetting and
preservation of phenol, soluble fibre, vitamins,
rehydrating the deep mass [15].
etc. Therefore, drying operation should normally
be intensified with some interest to remove water Hypothesis and research work objectives
at low temperatures, in order to avoid hardening
The new process of swell-drying implying the
and sugar crystallization [13].
instant controlled pressure-drop (DIC) technology
Grinding of dried products, as a simple mechanical could greatly intensify the limiting mass transfer
treatment is normally not applied to high added phenomenon, reduce energy consumption, and
value foodstuffs. Usually super fruit powders are define friendly environment processes. Optimized
produced through the spray – drying process; a DIC treatment can improve the product
concentrated water solution juice is sprayed into a multidimensional qualities of nutritional, hygienic,
vessel where a hot-air stream is injected, allowing organoleptic, and convenience attributes. Thus,
the very small granules to be partially dried [13]. grinding DIC textured pieces of super fruits would
be an attractive alternative technology with the
In the case of food powder, opposite needs are
following potential advantages:
required. The granulometry must normally be
higher than 150-200 µm in order to avoid 1. The DIC expansion can remedy the initial
Dustiness presence, which implies cleaning, and compact structure issued from the shrinkage
healthy problems even explosion risks. However, during the usual drying with a highly porous
the functional properties are normally linked to structure, and a greater specific surface area.
the specific surface area, which is, by assuming The drying time and energy are reduced and
the hypothesis of normal spherical compact the drying capacity of a drier highly increases.
granules, proportional to 1/(ρD) where ρ is the
density and D the granule diameter. The specific
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2. Natural flavour and colour normally loosed in
classic hot air dried super fruits because of the
long time high temperature during the final
stage of drying, are presently preserved.
3. Natural contamination associated with the
various stages of harvesting, pressing and
drying is eliminated by the thermal and
micromechanical effects of DIC as respectively
High Temperature Short Time treatment, and
instant pressure drop. The swell-drying will
help in the modernization of the food drying
industry, allowing the operation to be more
effective, less energy consuming, and inducing
perfect decontamination.
4. Price value of final product will be increased
because of its high quality similar even better
than freeze-dried.
5. Handling processing cost will be reduced.
6. The swell-drying would be a very relevant
preservation method in the sustainable
development policy, considerably enlarging
the economical value of agroressources,
valorizing various byproducts. By combining
simple drying methods (just after harvesting
sun and solar drying), with centralized DIC
treatment, it would be possible to preserve
agro resource raw materials or get them for
food, cosmetic or pharmaceutical uses.
Nowadays, the DIC treatment allows the product
to be completely decontaminated, total drying
time is reduced by at least 50% and the process
saves about 40% energy. Swell-drying of fruits and
vegetables has been defined by Allaf and Vidal
(1988), who recommend a first stage drying till 20
– 30% dry basis, the instant controlled pressure
drop DIC treatment as steaming up to 1 MPa for
some seconds and dropping the steam pressure
towards vacuum 0.1MPa in less than 1 s., and final
drying for normally 1 or 2 hours. However, such
drying process seemed to be adapted to only low
moisture content products in order to act as close
as possible to the glass transition zone (Mounir
and Allaf; 2008). In this paper, a new concept of
this operation has been defined to produce
decontaminated, quality preserved, expanded
granule dried powder increasing the storing time.
Instantaneous Controlled Pressure-Drop DIC
Technology:
The DIC (Détente Instantanée Contrôlée) is a
technology involving an abrupt autovaporization
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through an immediate relaxation bringing the
product to a relatively low pressure. The water
vaporizes brutally inside the sample, often causing
an expansion within the product, thus the product
may get a homogeneous swelled structure. The
higher the porosity, the greater the water
diffusivity. The kinetics and the level of
temperature thus implied during the final drying
stage should allow a better biochemical
preservation of vitamin and organoleptic contents
of the final product.
As HTST treatment, DIC is also a very environment
friendly process, it requires no toxic solvents. It
takes minutes where other processes take hours
and it reduces energy consumption. The cost of
energy consumption and equipment price is
lower.
Materials and methods
Raw material
Two types of Canadian by-products issued from
cranberry juice processing were used as raw
materials, and supplied by ABCAR-DIC Process Co.
(La Rochelle, France): the pomace and the seeds
having as initial moisture contents 141% db and
109% db respectively.
Treatment protocol
Raw material First stage of 40°C DIC
treatment
preparation hot air drying
according to
toward 45%-5% db
RSM design
Characterization assessment Final stage of 40°C
Hot air drying
Microbiology, Sensorial, Structural,
biochemical… toward 5% db
water content
Figure 1: Main stages of DIC swell-drying treatment
The treatment started by a 40 °C hot air drying
stage leading the samples to 5%-45% db water
content, to be DIC treated at 0.2 to 0.5 MPa as
steam pressure during a processing time between
5 and 15 s according to an experimental design. A
final drying stage is carried out to get 5% db as
final water content.
Treatment of drying kinetics
The model of MOUNIR & ALLAF (2009) was
adopted for studying the drying kinetics; it implies
three stages of initial surface interaction, diffusion
phase, and finally, a paradoxical phase. The
experimental results used for the mass diffusion using software STATGRAPHICS for Windows to
model excluded the ones close to t=0 as well as determine response surface, empirical model, R²…
the ones implying the paradoxical phase (long
time stage); they permitted to determine the Results
effective diffusivity Deff of water within the Figures 3, 4, 6, and 7 show the effective diffusivity
porous medium. By extrapolating this diffusion Deff and the starting accessibility ΔWs versus
model towards t=0, Wo was calculated as, usually, operative DIC parameters. The DIC treatment
different from the initial humidity content Wi. The permits to greatly increase the effective diffusivity
difference between Wi and Wo defined as the Deff as well as the starting accessibility ΔWs of both
starting accessibility ΔWs=Wi–Wo traduces the pomace and seeds of cranberry.
humidity quickly removed from the surface,
1Central 4 Central 7 Cent ral 2 10 cent ral 13 cent ral
independently from diffusion processes. 16 cent ral
8
17
19 cent ral
9
18
22 central
11
20
3
12
21
5
14
MP
6
15

50.00%

45.00%
Adsorption isotherm Cranberry pomace

Water content / % Dry Basis

40.00%

35.00%
The possible modification of water activity aw due 30.00%

to the expansion; aw must be considered as the 25.00%

20.00%
third parameter characterizing the swell-drying. 15.00%

10.00%

The adsorption isotherms were determined using 5.00%

the gravimetric method at 25°C. This method is 0.00%

0 100 200 300 400
time / min 500

based on using saturated salt solutions (KOH,
MgCl2, K2CO3, NaNO3, KCl and BaCl2), providing
constant water partial pressures inside glass
desiccators with water activities of 0.08, 0.32,
Figure 2: The kinetics of 40 °C hot air drying achieved on
various DIC treated samples of pomace of cranberry.
Estimated Response Surface for cranberry pomace
Starting accessibility ΔWs

water content%=25.0
0.43, 0.73, 0.84 and 0.90 respectively. 0.5 g
samples were weighed every two days time, with 0.4
0.1
sensitivity about ± 0.0001 g. The equilibrium was -0.2
-0.5
achieved within 14 days once the weight -0.8 36
-1.1 32
decreased less than 0.001 g. The moisture content 0.29 0.33 0.37 0.41 0.45 28
0.49 0.53 24 Time (s)
of each sample was determined by the oven
Steam pressure (MPa)
method at 105 °C for 24 h.
Figure 3: The response surface of the starting
Statistical and experimental design protocol accessibility ΔWs for cranberry pomace.
In order to study and optimize the impact of the The regression model of the starting accessibility
DIC operative parameters, a 3 variable – 5 level ΔWs (R²=81.23%) is:
central composite RSM method was adopted.
∆Ws=1,83+7,79P-0,43t+0,083W-3,56P²+0,1125Pt-
Table 1 shows the operative parameter values of 0,179PW+0,0065t²+0,0002tW+0,0002W²
the steam pressure P (expressed in MPa), the
initial water content W (% dry basis) and the where P is the steam pressure (MPa), t, the
processing time t (in seconds). thermal time (s) and W, the water content (% db).
Estimated Response Surface for cranberry pomace relative effective diffusivity
Tab.1: The 3 parameter – 5 level experimental design of water content%=25.0
cranberry pomace and seeds.
9.3
Point -α -1 0 +1 +α 8.3
Deff/Deff (RM)

7.3
6.3
Abs. steam pressure (MPa) 0.20 0.28 0.40 0.52 0.6 5.3
4.3 36
Water content (% db) 5 13 25 37 45 3.3 32
0.29 0.33 0.37 0.41 0.45 28 e nt
0.49 0.53 24 l treatm
Time (s) 20 24 30 36 40 he rma (s)
Steam pressure (MPa) T time

The main response parameters were: the drying
kinetics, expressed through the drop of the
starting moisture content ΔWs and the effective
diffusivity Deff, as well as the water activity aw…
The statistical treatment of results was carried out
Figure 4: The response surface of effective diffusivity
Deff for cranberry pomace.
The regression model of the relative effective
diffusivity Deff/Deff(RM), is (with R²=76,69%):
Deff/Deff(RM)=29.4227-68.6585P-1.843t+1.063W+152.034P²
+0.1458Pt-2.156PW+0.0388t ²-0.016tW++0.0051W²

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 01 DIC 04 DIC 07 DIC 02 DIC 10 DIC 13 DIC
16
08
DIC
DIC
19
09
DIC
DIC
22
11
DIC
DIC
03
12
DIC
DIC
05 DIC
14 DIC
06 DIC
15 DIC
Figure 8: Effect of DIC treatment on the adsorption
17 DIC 18 DIC 20 DIC 21 DIC MP
isotherm at 25°C of the cranberry pomace and seeds
Water content (% Dry Basis) 50
45 Cranberry seeds
40 Conclusion
35
30 Such a special thermal and mechanical treatment
25
20 implies various advantages. It is a well controlled
15 operation in terms of energy consumption,
10
5 kinetics and quality of end product. Although the
0 100 200 300 400 500 initial natural structure is lightly modified, kinetics
time (min)
of both drying and rehydration greatly increase.
Figure 5: The kinetics of 40 °C hot air drying achieved on Natural taste used to be lost in the usual drying
various DIC treated samples of cranberry seeds. operations, may presently be preserved. Natural
Estimated Response Surface for cranberry seeds contamination associated with the various stages
water content%=25.0 of harvesting, cutting and drying is eliminated
Starting accessibility ΔWs

0.15
thanks to the thermal and micromechanical
0.05 effects of DIC. Handling processing cost is
-0.05
-0.15 reduced.
-0.25 36
-0.35 32
0.29 0.33 0.37 0.41 0.45 0.49 28 (s) References
0.53 24 me
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Figure 6: The response surface of the starting du 6 août 1993.
accessibility ΔWs for cranberry seeds. [2] Mounir S., Allaf K.; 2009, Study and modeling of dehydration
and rehydration kinetics within porous medium; AFSIA, Lyon
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3 vacuum of in pieces vegetables in view of a rapid re-hydration"

2.8 Gradient Activity Plotting University of Technology of
2.6 36 Compiegne UTC N° CR/89/103, industrial SILVA-LAON
2.4 32 partner [June 1989].
0.29 0.33 0.37 0.41 0.45 0.49 28 e
24 im [6] Chu S. T., & Hustrulid A. (1968). General characteristics of
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rma
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0.35
0.35 Statistics. n° 28, pp. 195-241.
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after DIC 0.3 after DIC

0.3
before DIC [14] Abdullah, E. C, Geldart, D. 1999. The use of bulk density
(kg water/kg db)
(kg water/kg db)

0.25 0.25 before DIC

0.2 0.2
measurement as flowability indicators. Powder technology 102,
0.15 0.15 151-165.
0.1 0.1 [15] Teunou, E., Fitzpatrick, J.J., Synnott, E.C. 1999.
0.05 0.05 Characterisation of food powder Flowability. J. Food Eng., 39:
0 0
0 0.5 1 0 0.5 1
31-37.
Aw Aw

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