Effect of Spray Drying on Recovery and Physicochemical Properties of Acid Lime Juice Powder

Abstract

Acid lime is known for its tart flavor and is commonly used for culinary uses. Market glut during its peak production and high demand in its off season has been a key issue in the post-harvest handling and management of acid lime. Processing this fruit into a powder form for its several food uses can be solution to avoid distress sale by farmer, making a ready to use product available to the consumers. Spray drying has been a novel technique for powder production from liquid foods without affecting its nutritional properties. Experiments were carried out for production of spray dried powder from acid lime juice using Maltodextrin as additive. The parameters viz., temperature of inlet air (140–160°C), concentration of maltodextrin (14–18%) and feeding rate (62.5–112.5 mL/h) were optimized with Response Surface Method. The optimized levels of temperature of inlet air, concentration of maltodextrin concentration and feeding rate were, 147.63°C, 16.27% and 90.94 mL/h, respectively for desirable recovery and quality of powder. The powder prepared at optimized conditions resulted maximum recovery (18.77%), water solubility index (94.788%), vitamin C (365.937 mg/100g) and total phenols content (183.695 mg/100g). Acid lime powder produced at optimized conditions showed mixture of heterogeneous particles (150 to 6000 nm). The scanning electron microscopy analysis presented variable shape particles with smooth surface as result of encapsulation.