PREPARATION AND STORAGE QUILITY OF GREEN CHILLI (CAPSICUM ANNUUM L.) POWDER AND PASTE

Abstract

A study was conducted at the Laboratory, Department of Food Engineering and Technology, Hajee Mohammad Danesh Science and Technology University, Dinajpur during April to June, 2018 with the green chilli fruits of the variety Bogra Local having three objectives: (i) to develop techniques for preserving green chilli as powder and paste, (ii) to assess the quality of those powder and paste during storage, and (iii) to find suitable techniques for their storage quality. The six treatments compared in the Completely Randomized Design replicated four were: T1- green chilli with pedicel, cut longitudinally, treated with 0.01% KMS solution, rinsed, sundried and made into powder; T2- green chilli with pedicel, cut longitudinally, sliced, treated with 0.01% KMS solution, rinsed, sundried and made into powder; T3- green chilli without pedicel, cut longitudinally, treated with 0.01% KMS solution, rinsed, sundried and made into powder; T4- green chilli without pedicel, cut longitudinally, sliced, treated with 0.01% KMS solution, rinsed, sun-dried and made into powder; T5- green chilli with pedicel, treated with 0.01% KMS solution, slight water was added and made into paste, and T6- green chilli without pedicel, treated with 0.01% KMS solution, slight water was added and made into paste. Nine traits noted were: (i) ratio of the green chilli fruits to the powder, (ii) ratio of the green chilli fruits to the paste, (iii) moisture content, (iv) vitamin C content, (v) recovery of the powder and the paste from the fruits, (vi) storage quality of the products for: (a) colour, (b) flavour (c) texture, and (d) overall acceptability. After getting the powder (T1 - T4) and the paste (T5 - T6), those were stored for 0, 30 and 60 days for their storage quality for the moisture and vitamin C contents. But their sensory traits noted on the 0 and the 60th day of storage were: colour, flavour, texture and overall acceptability. The results clarified that the chilli had initially 86.6% moisture and 115.71mg/100g vitamin C. The moisture contents in all the six products increased little up to the 60th day as their values were from 4.08 - 5.25 to 4.33 - 6.68 and 87.08 - 87.35 to 92.39 - 93.39%, in T3 - T4 and T5 - T6, respectively. But the vitamin C contents decreased much up to the 60th day. Still, the highest amount was noted in T4 (38.19) and T6 (17.32mg/100g) among the powder and the paste, respectively. Moreover, all the six treatments had notable statuses in terms of sensory evaluation test (6.50 - 7.70 for the colour, 6.10 - 7.40 for the flavour, 6.50 - 7.70 for the texture and 6.47 - 7.60 for the overall acceptability) in case of both the powder and the paste forms) up to the 60th day of storage. So, overall, the treatment T4 was the best one. The study further paved the ways to work with other varieties, other treatments (whole fruit with pedicel and whole fruit without pedicel), long storage period up to one year, various bagging materials for moisture and oxygen free conditions, microbial contaminations, packing sizes, etc. to develop new and more sustainable technologies to preserve the green chilli powder and the paste with their adequate nutritional quality, hygiene and value addition too.