TEXTURAL AND SENSORY ATTRIBUTES OF CURRIED RAW JACK FRUIT, FRIED AND PRESSURE COOKED

Studies were conducted to improve the texture and sensory qualities of raw jack fruit. Diced tender jack fruit was subjected to steam cooking (1 kg cm^-2 for 20 min) and oil frying at 150 ± 30C for 5 min and 180 ± 20C for 5 min, respectively. Minced mutton at 5% (w/w) of the jack fruit dice was incorporated into the curried recipe prepared from dice fried in oil at 150C to impart mutton flavor and tested for texture. The firmness of fried dice increased significantly as measured by peak force of 11.06 and 11.49 kg. cm^-2 compared to 0.33 kg. cm^-2 of steamcooked dice. Further, the sensory evaluation for texture and flavor of the samples in the curried recipe also revealed that the fry-treated samples (at 150 ± 30C) were better in quality than steam-cooked samples. The frying treatment of raw jack fruit dice increased the oil content of the dice (8.26% on FWB) compared to 0.6% in steamed dice. However, the treatment did not affect salt pick up.