Comparative evaluation on drying of pomegranate arils for production of Anardana

Wild pomegranate is an important wild fruit of family Punicaceae which has got great economic importance. Pretreated arils (steam blanched for 30 sec followed by sulphuring @ 0.3% for 60 min) were dried by different intermittent drying modes to minimise energy utilization and maximise quality retention of dried arils within lower cost. Various drying modes used were mechanical cabinet drying (60±2°C), sun drying (18–31°C), solar tunnel (21–39°C) drying, combination of solar tunnel + mechanical cabinet drier, combination of open sun + solar tunnel drier and combination of open sun+ solar tunnel + mechanical cabinet drier. The quality of dried arils (anardana) obtained were compared on the basis of various physical chemical and sensory characteristics besides energy utilization in each method with economic analysis. Arils dried in mechanical cabinet drier possessed highest values of desirable physico-chemical characteristics viz., colour, TSS (45.20°B), titratable acidity (11.40%), ascorbic acid (11.70 mg/100g), total sugars (25.45%), anthocyanins (33.76 mg/100g), phenols (126.05 mg/100g), crude fibers (35.91%), oil (8.89%) and antioxidant activity (65.22%). It took minimum time (26 h) to dry a given tray load, had minimum non enzymatic browning (0.06 OD), furfural (11.89 ppb) and hydroxy methyl furfural (0.90 ppm), beside highest energy consumption for drying. Mechanical cabinet dried arils were rated best among all drying modes on the basis of highest sensory scores. However, quality of solar dried anardana was found to be at par with the mechanically dried anardana with low cost of production (Rs 251 per kg as against Rs 326 per kg).