The Effect of Pre-Treatment on the Rehydration of Dried Apple Cube

The subject of the research was a comparative analysis of the rehydration process of dried apples in cubic form. Cubes of dried Idared apples were subjected to various pre-treatment processes, including steam blanching, microwave heating and osmotic dehydration in a sucrose solution. The pre-treatment was followed by a convection drying process conducted using two different drying systems. The rehydration process was carried out at a water temperature of 20 °C for 150 min. Rehydration kinetics, instantaneous increments in rehydrate mass and the relative and absolute moisture content of rehydrated samples were analyzed based on the tests. The rehydration process rates were also determined. It was observed that osmotic drying in a 10% sucrose solution reduced the rehydration process of dried apples by up to 32%.