Combined Drying of Apple Cubes by Using of Heat Pump, Vacuum-Microwave, and Intermittent Techniques

Apple cubes of 15 mm were dried naturally without adding any chemical preservative using various drying methods namely intermittent hot air–dehumidified air drying with cyclic temperature profile and step-up temperature profile, heat-pump-assisted (HP) drying, convective vacuum-microwave (C/VM) drying, and heat pump vacuum-microwave (HP/VM) drying. The drying kinetics of apple samples dehydrated by different methods was divided into characteristic drying periods and fitted with empirical models, which gave high value of determination coefficient. The application of C/VM in drying of fruits gave the shortest drying time compared to other drying methods (about 50 % of the total drying time). The drying time was affected by effective diffusivity ranging from 3.522 × 10 −8 to 1.431 × 10 −6 m 2 /min depending on the drying technique used. It was found that combined drying which apply vacuum microwave (C/VM, HP/VM) gave the lowest values in hardness and chewiness. In addition, HP/VM drying gave the highest retained total polyphenol content, antioxidant activity, and the best appearance quality.