Viscoelastic and Thermal Characteristics of Vegetable Puree‐based Baby Foods

Viscoelastic properties of three commercial vegetable puree‐based baby foods (pea, corn and wax bean) were evaluated in the temperature range of 20 to 80C using dynamic oscillatory viscometry, and the thermal properties were evaluated using a standard differential scanning calorimeter (DSC) (−10 to 100C). Test samples behaved like viscoelastic fluids with consistently higher magnitudes of storage modulus (G′) as compared to loss modulus (G″) in an oscillatory frequency (ω) range between 0.628 and 62.800 rad/s. Both G′ and G″ versusωdata were well fitted by a power‐type relationship at all temperatures employed in the study. However, the derived power‐law parameters of G′ and G″ showed no consistent trends with temperature. Both pea and wax bean purees exhibited similar viscoelastic patterns with an increase in both G′ and G″ at 50C, somewhat coinciding with the initiation of starch gelatinization. However, the corn puree exhibited a stronger elastic characteristic with starch gelatinization occurring around 80C. The rheological measurements were well supported by the calorimetric data from the DSC.