Preliminary Study on Long-Term Storage of Bulk Watermelon Puree

Watermelon is one of the major fruits in Malaysia and it ranks fifth in terms of production in the country. The produce has a short shelf-life span when after it has been processed and stored in liquid form. Thus, a preliminary study on the storage of watermelon puree was conducted to examine the quality of the product when it is in frozen form. The condition of bulk puree was chosen for this study to replicate the existing practice of a local company that produces frozen watermelon puree. The study aims to investigate the effects of these two storage conditions on the quality of the frozen puree in terms of microbial load, physical properties and lycopene level. The purees were packed in a nylon-Polyethylene (PE) packaging material with 5 kg each. Preliminary study results exhibited no significant difference between the conditions in terms of qualities that were studied on 2nd-month retrieval. Thus, based solely on the result of the study, the industry would be sufficient to store the product without having to blast it before storage.