Lycopene is a major pigment in tomatoes
that is largely responsible for the red color, and it has also important health
properties. As a natural source
of antioxidant, lycopene can prevent epithelial cancers and improve heart
health, preventing heart attacks and strokes. Since tomatoes and related
products are a major source of lycopene, it is very important to consider the
source of carotenoids (lycopene) in the human diet. The tomato skin contains
72% - 92% of the lycopene that is found in the water insoluble fraction and in
conventional hot-break processing, the majority of the outer tissues are
discarded as waste. Then, improving the quality of
tomato products as well as reducing the production cost will benefit greatly
the tomato growers, processors, and the consumers.
In this study, the authors aimed to develop a novel processing
technology to process whole tomatoes by a twin-screw continuous processor to
provide high temperature with shear. They evaluated the quality of
tomato paste and juice through their viscosity, color, flavor and nutritional
value and four processing methods were selected, including conventional hot
break, waring blender with steam, steam injection, and high temperature with
shear (HTS) in a twin-screw continuous processor. The HTS method applied high
temperature with shear mixer during hot-break tomato processing that improved
the efficiency of the extraction process and the resultant tomato products
possessed higher consistency, viscosity, and ly-copene content.
This work showed
that HTS method, utilizing whole tomatoes, produced a superior tomato product
with a better color, higher viscosity, and improved bioactive properties. In
short, this research has shown a novel processing technology, which yields a
tomato product with high quality, better nutrient value, and longer shelf life.
Future research will include optimization of the processing parameters and the
secondary utilization of tomato skin and seeds for further processing, such as
grinding them into a fine powder for addition into tomato products for
increased consistency and nutritional value.
Article by Qin
Xu, et al, from Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN, USA.
Full access: http://mrw.so/2C32uI
Image by Alan Piano, from Flickr-cc.
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