Astringency in an Intermediate Moisture Banana Product

In the development of an intermediate moisture banana product, it was found that ripe banana halves dehydrated to a moisture content of about 30%, following blanching and/or sulfiting, are remarkably astringent. In order to understand the cause of this phenomenon, total phenolics, leucoanthocyanins and vanillin‐reacting compounds were determined and found to be more extractable in astringent semidried bananas. Light microscopy observations showed that both blanching and sulfiting contribute to the leakage of tannin‐like compounds from the latex cells. Overall results conform with a mechanism by which appearance of astringency in semidried banana is due to diffusion of the astringency‐causing agents from the latex cells to the surrounding tissue.