After applying a vacuum pulse (70 mm Hg absolute pressure for
10 min) at the beginning of the process, osmotic dehydration (OD)
was carried out at atmospheric pressure and ambient temperature for
4 h. Five 80 g samples of strawberries were taken and mixed with a sucrose
solution of 60% (w/w) that was used as hypertonic solution, being
the ratio of solution–fruit (12.5:1 (v/w)) high enough to avoid significant
changes in concentration of the solution over time. Mass transfer
was enhanced by shaking at 140 rpm (orbital shaker, Ilshin Lab. Co.
Ltd., South Korea). Afterwards, dehydrated strawberries (250 g) were
drained, rinsed with distilled water to remove the excess of sucrose solution
and the excess of externalmoisturewas removedwith adsorbent
paper. Then fruitswere put on a previouslyweighed drying tray in order
to continue drying by using vacuum microwave heating (VMD).