Studies on Development and Quality Evaluation of Ginger Powder

Abstract

Ginger (Zingiber officina/e) is an important commercial crop grown for its aromatic rhizomes which are used both, as spice and medicine. Drying or dehydration is preferred to be better for ginger as compare to other processing operations because it reduces the cost of packaging, storage and transportation by reducing both the weight and volume of the final product. Present study is carried out to evaluate physical parameter, quality parameters for drying characteristics determination and also to evaluate the cost analysis of ginger powder. Drying of ginger was done in a tray dryer in thin layer drying at a sample thickness of 5 mm and at three drying temperature of 50, 60 and 70°C and three loading densities 1.5, 3 and 4.5 kg/m2 The bulk density of fresh raw ginger is greater than fresh slices ginger because of the presence of various impurities and the earth sticking on the rhizomes. The rate of drying is faster at lower loading density and also drying rate increases with the increase of temperature. The initial moisture content of ginger varies from 506.84% to 662.86% (d.b), whereas the final moisture content of ginger varies from 4.18 to 5.91% (d.b). The time taken for drying to reduce the initial moisture content to final moisture content varies in between 180-540 min. The moisture ratio varies inversely with drying time and the acidity of ginger powder varies inversely with the storage period. The selling price of 1 OOg of ginger powder was found Rs.55/-.