Development of Mathematical Models for Predicting Mass Transfer and Changes in Quality Properties of Falafel Prepared from Faba Bean (Vicia faba L.) by Air Frying Technique

Abstract

Air Frying technology is an innovative technique which could produce healthy fried food materials using hot air. The current work aimed to model the kinetic changes in mass transfer, texture and colour attributes and determining the temperature dependency of the rate constants of the mass transfer, texture and colour traits of the air-fried falafel during the air frying process. To achieve these objectives, five mathematical equations were applied to forecast the mass transfer through frying process. The findings of this study indicated that the air-fried falafel moisture content declined as the frying time increases at varied frying temperatures. The outputs of nonlinear regression analysis showed that the moisture loss of air-fried falafel could be satisfactorily fitted to the modified Page model. The outcomes discovered that the alterations in the texture and the total colour difference (ΔE) of air-fried falafel throughout frying process have linearly increased at varied temperatures and were properly fitted to the zero-order kinetic equation. Meanwhile, temperature dependence of the rate constant of moisture loss, texture and colour change was sufficiently described by the Arrhenius-type model. The increase in rate constants was detected because of the growth of frying temperature. The activation energy values of mass transfer, hardness and ΔE were 70, 21.8 and 0.167 kJ/mol, respectively. The information on kinetic modelling the quality changes during air frying of falafel could be beneficial for helping air fried falafel manufactures with the optimum conditions and quality as well.