Evaluation of Spray-Dried Salak Juice Powder with Sucralose as its Sweetener

Abstract

Salak fruit or snake fruit are non-climacteric fruits that have a low shelf life, and due to this issue, most farmers tend to create other salak products to make use of the rest of their harvest, such as salak wine, salak kombucha, and salak juice. Salak juice being one of the more favorable products tends to be frozen to increase its shelf life, the favorability of this product is due to it still preserving the main flavor profiles of salak. Whilst freezing the product solves the problem of preservation, there is now the problem of storage and transport. As frozen products require more specific conditions to be kept, it makes it harder for farmers to store and transport the product. Therefore, a solution of creating a powdered salak product using the spray drying process was done. This research is divided into two stages where the first stage of this experiment will be based on the physical and chemical analysis of the spray-dried salak juice using different amounts of maltodextrin and different inlet temperatures, whilst the second stage will be focused on analyzing the sensorial properties of salak juice powder when substituting sucrose with sucralose, as the addition of sweetener tackles the problem of sourness of the Thailand salak variation. The first stage analysis showed that Samples 3 ( 165 C Inlet temperature & 15% Maltodextrin), 5 ( 175 C Inlet temperature & 15% Maltodextrin), and 6 ( 175 C Inlet temperature & 25% Maltodextrin) had better quality metrics for salak juice powder. Sample 5 had the highest yield (99.2%), low moisture (3.24%), and excellent solubility (36.03 g/L). Sample 6 excelled in stability with the lowest water activity (0.173) and higher solubility (38.88 g/L). Sample 3 maintained competitive quality with a 95.2% yield and good solubility (35.01 g/L). These top three samples were selected for sensory evaluation. As for the second stage analysis of sensory evaluation, sweetened samples showed significantly higher sensory ratings than the raw product. Overall acceptability rose from 4.97 to 5.79–6.31, with taste improving from 4.05 to 5.67–6.36 and flavor from 4.79 to 5.64–6.13. Sucralose and sucrose enhanced palatability and masked bitterness, making the product more appealing.