4. Conclusion
This study shows that both blanching and freezing methods had
significant impact on polyacetylenes content in carrot. During frozen
storage polyacetylenes were found to decrease with storage
time irrespective of freezing method employed however the losses
in the samples which were blanched and stored were significantly
reduced. Among freezing treatments, blast freezing resulted in
higher retention of polyacetylenes and other quality factors such
as colour and texture compared to slow freezing. Among three
polyacetylenes FaDOH was found to be the most susceptible to
degradation during frozen storage of unblanched carrot slices, followed
by FaOH, whereas FaDOAc was the least affected. Changes in
the level of polyacetylenes during storage were adequately described
by Weibull modelling and it was found to be useful in demonstrating
the changes ocurred during processing and/or storage
on the polyacetylene content of carrot disks.