PhD Oral Defense: Dried Broccoli Stalk Through Application of Osmotic Dehydration and Microwave-Assisted Hot Air Drying

PhD Oral Defense of Nora Salina MD Salim, Bioresource Engineering

This study focuses on the valorization of broccoli stalk as dried food product rather being discarded in the field. Drying can increase the shelf life of food products by removing the water content to a point where the product is shelf-stable. There are various drying technologies in food processing and recent advent of hybrid system such as microwave-assisted
hot air drying is very promising. A study was conducted to compare the drying performance of broccoli stalk slices dried under hot air drying and microwave-assisted hot air drying. The results indicated that the microwave-assisted hot air drying was more efficient since it allowed faster moisture removal. Different treatments of preconditioning drying are suggested to improve the quality of dried product.

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