Journal of Food Engineering 78 (2007) 12071211

www.elsevier.com/locate/jfoodeng

Changes in textural and optical properties of oyster

mushroom during hot air drying
a,*
Nachiket Kotwaliwale , Pramod Bakane b, Ajay Verma c

a
Agro Processing Division, Central Institute of Agricultural Engineering, Bhopal 462 038 MP, India
b
Post Harvest Technology Scheme, Dr. PDKV, Akola, 444 104 MS, India
c
Faculty of Agricultural Engineering, Indira Gandhi Agricultural University, Raipur 492 001 CG, India

Received 27 August 2005; accepted 20 December 2005

Available online 17 February 2006

Abstract

Textural (hardness, cohesiveness, springiness, and chewiness) and optical (spectral surface reectance) properties of paddy straw
mushroom (Pleuratus spp.) were monitored during hot air drying of mushrooms in a cabinet tray drier at dierent air temperatures
50, 55, 60, and 70 C. Eect of pre-drying treatments, viz. blanching and sulphitation, was also monitored. Texture AnalyserTM and Hun-
terlabTM Colorimeter were used to determine textural and optical properties, respectively. During drying, hardness and chewiness of
mushrooms were increased, while cohesiveness and springiness increased initially and decreased at the nal stage of drying. Hardness
of mushroom dried at higher temperature was higher. Cohesiveness decreased with increased drying temperature. Blanched and dried
mushrooms had more hardness compared to other dried samples. Whiteness index of mushrooms decreased while yellowness index
increased during drying. Drying temperature had an inverse eect on whiteness of mushrooms. Sulphitation helped while blanching dete-
riorated whiteness retention during drying.
2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Drying; Mushroom; Texture; Colour; TPA

1. Introduction deteriorating immediately after their harvest. In view of their

high perishable nature, the fresh mushrooms have to be pro-
Mushroom, an edible fungus, has been used as a food cessed to extend their shelf life for o-season use. Drying is
item since ancient times. It grows on decomposed organic one of the common methods used for oyster mushrooms
matter and produce edible portion above the surface of and is achieved by various dryers viz., air-cabinet drier,
the substrate. Out of large varieties of mushrooms, less freeze drier, uidized bed drier, dehumidied-air drier
than 25 species are accepted as food and few of them have and solar drier.
assumed commercial signicance (Angle & Tamhane, Colour and texture of the product are of prime impor-
1974). Mushroom production in India has increased to tance to the consumer as product quality criteria which
more than 50,000 t/y (Tewari, Senthil Kumaran, Pandey, are aected by physico-chemical treatments to mushrooms
& Arumuganathan, 2004). This contribution comes mainly (Matser, Knott, Teunissen, & Bartels, 2000). Heat treat-
from rural agro setups. Mushrooms containing 32.7% ments like drying has been reported to aect colour and
crude protein, 2.4% crude fat and 47.7% total carbohy- texture of various products like tofu and milk Paneer
drate, are highly perishable commodities and they start (Pant, Chauhan, Verma, Kumbhar, & Singh, 1993),
banana (Boudhrioua, Michon, Cuvelier, & Bonazzi, 2002;
Cano-Chauca, Ramos, & Stringheta, 2002; Maskan,
*
Corresponding author. 2000) and potato (Caixeta, Moreira, & Castell-Perez,
E-mail address: [email protected] (N. Kotwaliwale). 2002). However, pre-drying treatments, viz. blanching

0260-8774/$ - see front matter 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.jfoodeng.2005.12.033
1208 N. Kotwaliwale et al. / Journal of Food Engineering 78 (2007) 12071211

and sulphitation also aect the quality of dried products. ing and spread over perforated aluminum trays and trays
The blanching temperatures commonly used in industry were kept in the drying chamber. Initial moisture content
(90100 C) may lead to undesirable tissue softening of mushroom was determined by vacuum oven method.
(Ahrne, Prothon, & Funebo, 2003) while sulphitation The samples were dried to a moisture content of 815%
causes colour retention. Colour changes during drying (w.b.) approximately. During the drying, colour and tex-
are mostly in the form of browning caused by enzymatic ture of the sample were recorded. Drying experiments
or non-enzymatic reactions between carbohydrate and were carried out at the temperature of 50 C, 55 C,
amino acids at elevated temperature. 60 C and 70 C. Samples of dried mushrooms were rehy-
A study was undertaken to assess changes in texture and drated at 32 C, 60 C, 80 C and 100 C in distilled water.
colour of mushrooms during drying and also to assess A sample of 23 g was taken for rehydration. Rehydration
eect of drying temperature and pre-drying treatments on was carried out till maximum weight of sample was
these parameters. obtained.
Texture Analyser (make: Stable Micro Systems, UK
2. Materials and method Model: TA-XT2i) was used for texture analysis of all the
samples. Texture analysis was carried out under following
Freshly harvested oyster mushroom (Pleurotus sp.) were instrument parameters: pre-test speed10 mm/s; test
procured from market. Immediately after harvest, they speed2 mm/s; post-test speed10 mm/s; time lag
were washed thoroughly in running tap to remove adhering between two compressions2 s; strain30% of sample
extraneous matter. The brown and damaged portions of height; trigger force0.05 N; data acquisition rate
mushroom were removed. Washed and cleaned mush- 200 pps; 12.7 mm hemispherical plastic probe; load cell
rooms were taken for the experimental studies. The follow- 25 kg with 1 g least count.
ing pre-treatments were given for 1 kg fresh mushroom Hardness, springiness, cohesiveness, and chewiness of
samples: Control; blanching in boiling water; soaking in the samples were calculated using the expressions as shown
0.53% potassium metabisulphite (KMS) for 15 min; soak- in Fig. 1.
ing in 0.75% KMS for 15 min; soaking in 1% KMS for HunterLab model Labscan XE was used for colour esti-
15 min; and soaking in 1.5% KMS for 15 min. mation of mushrooms. Measurements were carried out
Blanching was done by wrapping the fresh mushrooms using CIELAB scale at an observer angle of 10. Whiteness
in a clean cloth and immersing in boiling water for 2 min. index and yellowness index were calculated by the Univer-
Then immediately immersing in cold water and draining sal V3.71 software provided with the equipment. During
the water by spreading on perforated containers. After the drying of mushrooms three samples were removed from
washing and treatment of the mushrooms, unbound mois- the dryer at specic time and their colour (L, a, b) was
ture was present on the surface of the sample that was measured. During rehydration also three samples were
removed by centrifugation. taken for measurement of their colour. The instrument
After pre-treatment mushrooms were dehydrated using was standardized each time with a white and a black cera-
tray-dryer. Mushroom of 5001000 g were taken for dry- mic plate.

Fig. 1. The texture prole analysis (TPA). (Source: Anonymous, 2005).

 N. Kotwaliwale et al. / Journal of Food Engineering 78 (2007) 12071211 1209

Whiteness index 0.9

0.8
WI Y 800X n  x 1700Y n  y
0.7
X n 0:3138; Y n 0:3310
0.6
where Y, x and y are luminance factor and chromaticity
0.5
coordinates of the specimen and Xn and Yn are the chroma-
0.4
ticity co-ordinates for the CIE standard illuminant and
source used. 0.3
Yellowness index 0.2
 
CxX  CzZ 0.1
YI
Y 0
45 50 55 60 65 70 75
where Cz = 1.1498, Cx = 1.3013; X, Y and Z are Tristimu- Drying Temperature, C
lus values and the coecients.
Hardness Cohesiveness

3. Results and discussion Fig. 3. Eect of drying temperature on hardness and cohesiveness of dried
mushroom.
Textural characteristics viz. hardness/rmness, cohesive-
ness, springiness and chewiness of mushrooms changed
removal of moisture which might have caused collapse of
during drying. Fig. 2 shows that hardness and chewiness
capillary voids inside the product, for the similar reason
increased while springiness and cohesiveness increased ini-
cohesiveness decreased with increase in drying tempera-
tially but decreased at the nal stage of drying. Pant et al.
ture. Cano-Chauca et al. (2002) also found that at the
(1993) also reported increase in hardness and chewiness
end of drying, hardness of banana (in terms of cutting
and no change or very small change in cohesiveness and
force) was higher for the product dried at higher
springiness due to frying of tofu and milk Paneer. How-
temperature.
ever, trend of these properties during frying was not
Among the pre-drying treatments, blanching has caused
reported by them. Increase of hardness can be attributed
a marked eect on textural properties. Fig. 4 demonstrates
to removal of moisture and chewiness being a function of
that blanched mushrooms, when dried, had higher hard-
hardness too increased due to this. Cano-Chauca et al.
ness compared to other dried mushrooms. Also, cohesive-
(2002) also reported that cutting force, a measure of hard-
ness and springiness were found to reduce after
ness, increased as drying of banana progressed. They
blanching. These entire textural changes take place due to
attributed reason for this to increase in concentration of
hydro-thermal treatment causing denaturation of protein
other components with moisture removal during drying.
during the treatment and lling of inter molecular/capillary
Cohesiveness and springiness increased initially due to
voids.
moisture migration inside the mushroom body. However,
Texture of mushroom changed during rehydration pro-
when the moisture depleted to a stage that capillary voids
cess. Table 1 compares hardness and cohesiveness of mush-
were created, cohesiveness and springiness reduced. Such
rooms at various rehydration temperatures and for various
phenomenon of change in textural properties was observed
pre-drying treatments. It is evident that hardness decreased
for all temperatures of drying. Fig. 3 shows eect of drying
and cohesiveness increased during rehydration. Reduction
temperature on two of the textural properties i.e. hardness
of hardness can be ascribed to softening of bers and tissues
and cohesiveness of dried mushrooms. Hardness of sam-
ples dried at higher temperature was higher due to rapid

0.9
0.8
0.7
0.6
0.5
0.4
0.3
0.2
0.1
0.0
0 20 40 60 80 100 120 140 160
Drying time, min
Hardness, N Cohesiveness Springiness Chewiness

Fig. 2. Changes in mushroom texture during drying. Fig. 4. Eect of pre-drying treatment on the texture of dried mushrooms.
1210 N. Kotwaliwale et al. / Journal of Food Engineering 78 (2007) 12071211

Table 1
Changes in texture of mushroom during rehydration
Pre-treatment Temperature of rehydration, C Hardness Cohesiveness
Before rehydration After rehydration Before rehydration After rehydration
Control 32 0.701 0.283 0.497 0.699
60 0.165 0.683
80 0.224 0.709
100 0.665 0.516
Sulphited 32 0.703 0.309 0.497 0.51
60 0.5 0.69
80 0.44 0.55
100 0.857 0.511
Blanched 32 1.85 1.25 0.421 0.518
60 1.637 0.509
80 1.271 0.539
100 1.637 0.509

due to moisture while increase in cohesiveness can be attrib- reported that banana lost brightness (value of L
uted to lling of capillary voids by moisture. Reduction in decreased) as the drying progressed. They also showed that
hardness is not much in case of samples rehydrated at banana dried at lower temperature retained more bright-
100 C which may be due low time (12 min) of rehydration. ness compared to the samples dried at higher temperature.
Time required for complete rehydration at 32, 60 and 80 C Sulphitation helped in reduction of darkening of mush-
were 1180, 120, and 60 min, respectively. ANOVA of hard- rooms during drying. Fig. 6 indicates this fact and also that
ness vs. rehydration temperature showed that hardness of
mushrooms rehydrated at 100 C was signicantly dierent
from mushrooms rehydrated at other temperatures (F =
5.81). Pre-drying treatments also have a signicant eect
on the hardness of rehydrated mushrooms. Hardness of
blanched, rehydrated mushrooms was signicantly dierent
from that of control and sulphited (ANOVA of hardness vs.
treatment yielded F = 98.28).
Colour of mushrooms changes during drying. Whiteness
of mushrooms decreases while yellowness increases during
drying. Fig. 5 also shows that whiteness reduced while yel-
lowness increased due to increase in drying temperature.
This shows sensitivity of mushrooms to temperatures as
higher temperature may cause pigmentation in the mush-
rooms. Both these results are in agreement with Cano-
Chauca et al. (2002) who have reported color changes of
banana during drying in terms of L and a values. They Fig. 6. Eect of pre-drying treatments on darkness of dried mushrooms.
Yellowness Index

Drying time, min

100 Sulphitation, % KMS
-60
0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1 1.2
50 -70
-80
0
-90
Whiteness index

0 20 40 60 80 100 120 140 160

-50 -100
-110
Whiteness index

-100
-120
-150 -130
-140
-200
50C 55C 60C -150
-250 -160

Fig. 5. Eect of drying temperature and time on colour indices of Fig. 7. Eect of concentration of KMS on whiteness of rehydrated
mushrooms. mushrooms.
 N. Kotwaliwale et al. / Journal of Food Engineering 78 (2007) 12071211 1211

Table 2
Comparison of some quality parameters of fresh and rehydrated mushrooms dried under various pre-treatments
Property Fresh mushrooms Dried mushrooms rehydrated at 100 C
Control Sulphited (1%) Blanched
Moisture content 92.49 82.75 78.02 74.02
Hardness 0.462 0.665 0.701 1.181
Whiteness 73.84 142.82 97.03 91.77

blanching caused deterioration of colour due to darken- Whiteness of mushroom decreased while yellowness
ing of mushrooms. Improvement in colour of mushrooms increased during drying process. Higher drying tempera-
after sulphitation has been reported by many workers tures produced darker dried mushrooms. Opposite to dry-
viz. Suguna, Usha, Sreenarayanan, Raghupathy, and ing, the hardness decreased and cohesiveness increased
Gothandapani (1995), Deshpande and Tamhane (1981) during rehydration.
and Mudahar and Bains (1982). These workers reported
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