Physical, chemical and functional features of apple starch

Abstract

Physical, chemical and functional features of apple starch. Apple juice contains some chemical agents like starch that may cause long-term turbidity, both in room temperature and refrigerated storage, with depreciation of the commercial value explained by the undesirable appearance. The objective of this article was to characterize some physical, chemical and functional features of purified apple starch as an earlier step aiming to establish the best conditions for its elimination from apple juice, according to routine processing. Apple starch was purified by an alkaline treatment with NaOH 0.15 N and washed with tap water down to neutral pH, and then dried at room temperature. Dry and purified cassava and corn starches were used as standards. Moisture level of apple starch was 13.5 g/100g, crude protein 0.03 g/100g, ash 2.49 g/100g, ether extract 0.04 g/100g and crude fiber 1.56 g/100g. Apple starch was characterized concerning chemical and functional aspects including rheological features like viscoelasticity, clarity and gel strength of the pastes. Apple starch granules in aqueous suspension were submitted to different temperatures aiming to determine their swelling power and solubility. Apple starch granules were also observed in scanning electronic microscope at 3.180x zoom. The results clearly show the apple starch with a functional behavior intermediate to the starches of cassava and of corn used as reference and may be used in order to establish an industrial procedure aiming to remove completely the starch during the processing of clarified apple juice.