Texture development in carrots preparation

Topic 1. Analysis of the factors contributing to the texture development in carrots during boiling.

One of the paramount concerns of the food industry is to control the quality of food products. However, quality is a vague term. Thus, it is very useful and relevant to decompose quality into food quality attributes. These quality attributes are characteristics of the food that play a significant role in the acceptance of a product by consumers. Significant quality attributes are color, texture, taste, aroma, nutritional value etc. Due to time limitation, it is not possible to study all these quality attributes. So, two of them are selected as representative (color and texture) and especially for carrots, the research will focus on texture development during thermal processing.
Objective of this research is to analyse the various factors that play a role in the texture development (softening) of carrots during boiling.

The ultimate goal is to develop a tool that the food industry can use in order to predict and control food quality attributes during thermal processing. Development of the relevant kinetic model is therefore necessary.

This research includes sample preparation and measurements regarding the factors that play significant role in the development of texture (softening) in carrots during boiling (pectin degradation, water content, temperature, texture expressed as young’s modulus etc.). An introduction to kinetic modeling is included as well.

Topic 2. Analysis of the factors contributing to the color development in potato fries during deep fat frying

One of the paramount concerns of the food industry is to control the quality of food products. However, quality is a vague term. Thus, it is very useful and relevant to decompose quality into food quality attributes. These quality attributes are characteristics of the food that play an important role in the acceptance of a product by consumers. Significant quality attributes are color, texture, taste, aroma, nutritional value etc. Due to time limitation, it is not possible to study all these quality attributes. So, two of them are selected as representative (color and texture) and this research on French fries will focus on color development during thermal processing.
Objective of this research is to analyse the various factors that play a role in the color development in the crust of potato fries during deep fat frying. Development of the relevant kinetic model is necessary for this.
The ultimate goal is to develop a tool that the food industry can use in order to predict and control food quality attributes during thermal processing.

This research includes sample preparation and measurements regarding the factors that play significant role in the development of color in the crust of potato fries during deep fat frying (glucose, fructose, asparagine, water content, temperature, color, etc.) Regarding the MSc student, an introduction to kinetic modeling is included as well.

For more information please contact Georgios Andrikopoulos.