Retort process modelling for Indian traditional foods.

Indian traditional staple and snack food is typically a heterogeneous recipe that incorporates varieties of vegetables, lentils and other ingredients. Modelling the retorting process of multilayer pouch packed Indian food was achieved using lumped-parameter approach. A unified model is proposed to estimate cold point temperature. Initial process conditions, retort temperature and % solid content were the significantly affecting independent variables. A model was developed using combination of vegetable solids and water, which was then validated using four traditional Indian vegetarian products: Pulav (steamed rice with vegetables), Sambar (south Indian style curry containing mixed vegetables and lentils), Gajar Halawa (carrot based sweet product) and Upama (wheat based snack product). The predicted and experimental values of temperature profile matched with ±10 % error which is a good match considering the food was a multi component system. Thus the model will be useful as a tool to reduce number of trials required to optimize retorting of various Indian traditional vegetarian foods.