Vol. 14, Issue 2 (2025)

Author(s):
Rodrina Culipossa Chivala and Bettencourt de Jesus Coxe Munanga

Abstract:
The current study was carried out to determine the effect of the degree of gelatinization on the kinetics of drying, physical-chemical and sensory characteristics of taro flour. For this purpose, taro slices of 0.5 cm in thickness were cooked in different periods, namely 0, 20, 40 and 60 minutes, respectively. Four mathematical models were used to represent taro drying. The logarithmic model proved to be more adjusted for this study, where the R2 regression coefficient showed values around 0.999 for the different samples studied. Regarding the functional properties, it was observed that the solubility of taro flour decreases with incubation time and gelatinization degree of taro flour. The Principal Component Analysis of the sensory analysis showed that the most appreciated taro flour was the TG40 sample, which was characterized by color, chewing elasticity, preference and crunchiness.