Application Studies / Fruit Fillings

Fruit Fillings

Industry:

Food

Produce

Baked

Gels

Attributes measured:

firmness

hardness

adhesiveness

stringiness

Background

We tested the firmness and adhesiveness of a dozen types of thick fruit fillings with the TA.XTPlus Texture Analyzer to illustrate a simple, operator-independent procedure for differentiating even subtle differences between fillings. Thick fruit fillings are notorious to quality control because they are highly variable due to inconsistent fruit quality, particulates & seeds, and variable background matrices. These inconsistencies can cause extremely variable viscosity readings. Penetrometers cannot differentiate thickness differences between most fruit fillings. Furthermore, rheometers and penetrometers cannot measure adhesive parameters which are extremely important to control for some end-product applications. The difficulties inherent in manufacturing the fillings lead to difficulty in manufacturing end products with consistent and desirable textures.