Kinetics of moisture loss and oil uptake during deep fat frying of Gethi (Dioscorea kamoonensis Kunth) strips

Investigation was carried out to study kinetics of moisture loss, oil uptake and tristimulus colour during deep fat frying of Gethi (Dioscorea kamoonensis kunth) strips. Deep fat frying of Gethi strips of size 6 x 6 x 40 mm was carried out in a laboratory scale fryer at different temperatures ranging from 120 to 180 degrees C. The investigation showed that the moisture loss and oil uptake followed the first order kinetics equation (r> 0.95, p< 0.05). The kinetic coefficients for moisture loss and oil uptake increased significantly (p< 0.05) with temperature from 0.166 to 0.889 min(-1) and 0.139 to 0.430 min(-1) respectively. The temperature dependency of rate constants for moisture loss and oil uptake values was described using Arrhenius equation (r> 0.99, p< 0.01). The activation energies for moisture loss and oil uptake were found to be 41.53 KJ/mol and 27.12 KJ/mol respectively. The hunter colour parameters were significantly affected by frying temperature and frying time. The hunter lightness (L) value increased with respect to frying time initially, followed by decline and same trend was observed at higher temperatures of frying with elevated rate, whereas hunter redness (a) value increased significantly (p< 0.01) with time as well as temperature of frying and obeyed zero order rate equation. The temperature dependency kinetic coefficients of Hunter (a) value were described by Arrhenius equation and the energy of activation for change in hunter redness was found to be 42.41 KJ/mol (r> 0.99, p< 0.01). The other hunter colour parameters such as chroma, hue angle and total colour difference were markedly affected by frying temperature as well as frying time.