THE INFLUENCE OF COLD CONVENTIONAL STORAGE ON FRUITS QUALITY

Abstract

To determine the most suitable method of cold fruits preservation, we used three types of fruits: pome fruits (apples, pears and quinces), citrus (oranges) and exotic fruits (kiwi and bananas). The fruits were stored, using a household refrigerator, operating at refrigeration temperature (5˚C) and freezing temperature (-10˚C). The storage was made in two variants: bulk and packed fruits (using LDPE bags) for a total period of 14 days. Temperature measurements were made with a two day frequency, inside the storage space and in the fruits’ core. To determine the water losses during evaporation, the fruits were weighted, before and after the storage. During the refrigeration of the bulk fruits, the quince, the orange and the banana registered a constant evolution, while the behaviour of the same packed fruits was irregular. The evolution of bulk fruits represented by quince, orange and banana, during freezing period, was regular while for the packed ones such as banana, apple and orange we registered the best results. The results lead to the conclusion that the refrigeration storage of the bulk pome fruits had a lower quantity of moisture losses (2.5-4.1%) comparing to the exotic fruits (6.5-21.3%). In packed fruits case the lowest quantities of moisture losses were registered in the pome fruits (0.6-1.1 %). To draw a final conclusion, orange and apple presents the best evolution during the conventional cold preservation, while the behaviour of banana and kiwi is not proper for this kind of storage.