When the homogenized coconut milk samples were
subjected to heat treatments, small fat globules formed
irregular rearrangement of aggregates. Naturally, coconut
milk composes of fat globules surrounded by the
aqueous protein solution (Gonzalez et al., 1990). Addition
of emulsifier and stabilizer helped in the stability
of coconut milk by lowering the interfacial tension between
two phases, therefore fat globules could disperse
throughout the water phase. Fig. 3 exemplifies the effect
of sterilizing temperature on the structure of fat globule.
When the samples were heated at high sterilizing temperature,
some heat labile proteins were destroyed
(Seow & Gwee, 1997) and fat globules tended to form
aggregates. Therefore, the emulsion system contained
less suspended single fat globules to resist the flow.
The micrographs supported the results from the rheological
studies that decreasing in viscosity of heated treated
homogenized coconut milk was caused from the
change in microstructure.