Preparation and Storage of Tomato (Lycopersicon esculentum Mill.) Kammarakattu in Different Packaging Materials

AbstractIn order to reduce the post-harvest losses of tomato during glut period and when there is no minimum support price, it is an important to go for value addition of tomatoes to provide entrepreneurial opportunities at rural and urban level. Asweet item, kammarakattu was developed by using the traditional preparation method which gained popularity in South India by incorporating the tomato pulp. The tomato pulp with an addition of jaggery and desiccated coconut powder, processed until achieving a TSS of 85° Brix, thereafter molded into sheets (thickness 4-6 mm), cut into a uniform size and kept for storage studies in different packing materials under different treatments viz., low-density polyethylene, highdensity and polypropylene containers and studied the shelf life of the product at ambient temperatures. The findings revealed that the lycopene content and anti-oxidant activity were increased in the developed product. It is a low cost and nutritious sweet item and had a lot of scope to create entrepreneurship opportunities among the rural women and youth. Similarly, it will reduce the post-harvest losses of the tomato during the period of glut.