How Can Fruit Juice Processing Conserve Natural Resources/Flavor

The traditional juice processing method is mainly based on thermal processing in nowadays. Juice thermal processing refers to fruit beating and pulping, juice extraction, blending or mixing, sterilization and filling are all based on thermal processing. As we all know, in the heat treatment process of fruit juice or beverage, when the temperature reaches 70-80°C, a large number of vitamins are destroyed, and the aroma and flavor of the fruit volatilize. Therefore, the nutrition and flavor of the juice during heat treatment are largely lost, which reduces the quality of the juice. But because natural juice contains a lot of microorganisms, after obtaining the juice, we must sterilize the juice and then fill it in a closed container, so that the juice has a stable shelf life. In order to achieve maximum retention of the nutrition and flavor of the juice, and at the same time make the product have a good shelf life, we usually adopt the following measures:

After the fruit is crushed, the cell structure of the fruit pulp is destroyed, and the nutrients in the fruit will be mixed together. then vitamin C and oxidase in the fruit will react to make the vitamin great loss. In order to solve this problem, during fruit juice processing, we use tubular or tube in tube preheater or blancher to preheat the broken fruits to inactivate enzymes. This processing method can not only prevent the loss of nutrients but also increase the juice yield and avoid juice browning.

Cold beating or squeezing juice, this kind of juicer usually uses hydraulic or pneumatic means to extract juice at room temperature to obtain the highest juice yield. The most representative is the Bucher Universal hydraulic filter press. At present, Due to the limitation of production capacity and juice yield rate, the cold pressing technology of juice has not been applied on a large scale in industrial production lines. Most of are used in beverage shops or small-scale juice extraction workshops. The cold press juice technology will match with cold sterilizing and cold filling. So as to the whole juice processing will not be thermal affecting.

When producing concentrated juice or bottled mixing juice, the evaporator or degasser can equip aroma recovery system to gather the aromatic substance during the processing.

The common and mature method for sterilizing juice is using thermal treatment. Different heat treatment sterilization technologies have different effects on the nutrient loss of juice. In theory, the lower sterilization temperature and the shorter sterilization time, the smaller impact on the quality of the juice. According to this feature, short-time pasteurization is better than UHT sterilization, and UHT sterilization is better than long-time low-temperature pasteurization. However, with the development of sterilization technology, more and more cold sterilization technologies have gradually begun to be applied to fruit juice industrial production fields, such as HPP and PEF sterilization technology, irradiation sterilization.

There are three types of filling technology in juice processing, cold filling(5-7℃), room temperature filling(30℃) and hot filling(89℃). The lower temperature filling, the less loss of the nutrient of juice. But cold filling and aseptic filling equipment will also be much more expensive because they need to use auxiliary equipment to ensure the juice is free from bacteria and extend shelf life.