Optimum Conditions of Fluidized Bed Puffing for Producing Crispy Banana

Abstract

Oil-free snacks have been increasingly demanded by health-conscious consumers. Bananas, which are among the world's leading fruit crops, can be served as a snack. Because a porous structure is an important requirement for crispy banana, a high-temperature short-time treatment were chosen in this study. The effect of operating parameters—that is, intermediate moisture content, puffing temperature, and puffing time—on the volumetric shrinkage and quality attributes of banana were studied. The experimental results showed that the puffing temperature, puffing time, and intermediate moisture content significantly affected the shrinkage, hardness, and crispiness properties as well as color. The intermediate moisture content provided higher or lower shrinkage depending on its level and this factor subsequently affected the textural properties. The higher puffing temperature and longer puffing time resulted in less shrinkage, better texture, and a browner color. A second-order polynomial equation explained the quality parameters reasonably well. All quality parameters, except for volumetric shrinkage, were optimized by means of response surface methodology and the results showed that anintermediate moisture content of 26% db, puffing temperature of 163°C, and puffing time of 1 min should be established for puffed banana using a fluidized bed technique. Another experiment was conducted under the optimum condition to validate the quality parameters with predictions and the differences between experimental data and predictions were insignificantly different at p < 0.05.

Keywords:

• Crispiness
• Fluidization
• Optimization
• Quality
• Snack

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The authors express their sincere appreciation to the National Science and Technology Development Agency (NSTDA), Thailand Research Fund, and King Mongkut's University of Technology Thonburi for supporting the project financially.

Notes

Y ₁ = shrinkage, Y ₂ = hardness (N), Y ₃ = initial slope (N/mm), Y ₄ = number of peaks, Y ₅ = color (L), Y ₆ = hue angle.

*Significant at p < 0.05.

*Significant at p < 0.05.