Physico-chemical quality and microbial safety evaluation of ready-to-eat freshcut watermelon and pineapple sold in Imus, Cavite, Philippines

Abstract

The study aimed to evaluate the physico-chemical quality and microbial safety of ready-to -eat fresh-cut watermelon and pineapple sold in selected wet markets and supermarkets in Imus, Cavite. These two fruits are the top-selling fresh-cut fruits in the area based on a prior survey conducted. Higher water soaking scores were obtained from fresh-cut fruits in wet markets while lower visual quality scores were obtained from wet market samples compared with those from supermarkets. Comparing fresh-cuts from whole fruits, lower vitamin C content was observed on fresh-cut samples than whole fruit samples. For Total plate count of fresh-cut watermelons, no sample exceeded the maximum tolerance level (107 CFU/mL) for the production day for the supermarket samples while 3 out of 6 samples from the wet markets had exceeding levels. For pineapple, the number of samples which exceeded the tolerance levels were 4 out of 6 from supermarkets and 3 out of 6 from wet markets. For yeast and molds count, (maximum tolerance level is 104 ), all watermelon samples did not have exceeding levels while 5 out of 6 samples both from supermarkets and wet markets had exceeding levels. For Total coliforms, maximum tolerance is 102 . All watermelon samples exceeded this level. For pineapple, all from supermarkets and 3 out of 6 samples from wet markets exceeded the levels. All fresh-cut pineapple and watermelon samples were negative for Escherichia coli. For watermelon, 2 samples each from supermarkets and wet markets were positive for Salmonella while for pineapple, 1 sample from the supermarket and 3 from wet markets turned out positive.