Abstract

Drying of pineapple (Ananas comosus) pulp enhances shelf life while assuring all-year-round availability of pineapple in different forms. The difficulty in selecting suitable fruit pulps for producing acceptable dried pulp needs to be addressed in order to reduce variability in dried pineapple pulps and predict consumer acceptability. MD2 and Smooth cayenne fruits were used for the study. Relationships existing between chemical and sensory characteristics of oven-dried pineapple pulps were determined using standard procedures. While a strong positive correlation was found between total soluble solids (TSS) and taste (SC=0.98; MD2=0.99) a negative association was found between TSS and crispness (SC=-0.98; MD2=-0.99) as well as between total titratable acidity (TTA) and taste (SC=-0.99; MD2=-0.98). The study showed that TSS of the fresh fruit was the single most important predictor of overall acceptability of dehydrated pulps. TSS of fresh fruits could therefore be used to select fresh pulps for dehydration.

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