York cabbage was blanched between 80 and 100 C with an increment of 5 C for up to 14 min and kinetics
of the different physicochemical properties were studied. Significant reductions in the texture, colour,
polyphenols (PPs) and antioxidant (AO) capacity were observed due to blanching. Total phenolic and flavonoid
content retained ranged from 19.6–24.5% to 22.0–25.7%, respectively. Heavy losses in the AO
capacity of 74.0–82.0% also occurred as a result of blanching. Blanching caused a significant reduction
in firmness of 24.0–73.2% and a similar trend was also observed for colour. Kinetic evaluation of degradation
was carried out for all the studied quality parameters. The fractional conversion first-order reaction
model showed a good fit for the different studied parameters, with coefficients of determination
ranging from 0.892 to 0.992, except for texture and colour, which followed first order and zero order
kinetics, respectively. The temperature effect followed the Arrhenius law, with activation energies for
polyphenolic content, AO capacity, colour and texture calculated as 9.22–11.5, 9.05–35.05, 15.73 and
33.8 kJ/mol K, respectively.