Though fresh-cut products save our time, but they are very much prone to enzymatic browning that drastically affects product's quality and marketability. Drumstick pods are considered as super food due to high nutritional contents. However, the fresh-cut pods are prone to brown discoloration. The enzyme activities promote the softening and cut-surface browning of pods, thus deteriorates their texture, decreases consumer appeal and shortens the shelf life. So, we aimed to assess the effect of citric (1%) and ascorbic (1%) acid treatments on quality attributes of fresh-cut drumsticks at 3-d interval during storage (5 ± 1 °C). In general there was an increase in lignin and quinone contents, while phenolic content was decreased during storage. However, samples subjected to ascorbic acid dip had higher phenolic content, lower rate of lignin formation, and reduced membrane permeability. Enzyme activities (polyphenol oxidase and peroxidase) were found to increase during storage, however, samples treated with ascorbic acid showed lower activities than that of the control and citric acid treated samples. The reduced enzyme activities resulted in the reduced browning incidence and maintained the quality. Therefore, postharvest dip of fresh-cut drumstick in to ascorbic acid (1%) could be suggested to increase the shelf life with reduced browning during low temperature storage.
Tomato (Solanum lycopersicon L.) fruit is rich in various nutrients, vitamins and health-promoting molecules. Fresh tomatoes are an important part of the Mediterranean gastronomy, and their consumption is thought to contribute substantially to the reduced incidence of some chronic diseases in the Mediterranean populations in comparison with those of other world areas. Unfortunately, tomato fruit is highly perishable, resulting in important economic losses and posing a challenge to storage, logistic and supply management. This review summarizes the current knowledge on some important health-promoting and eating quality traits of tomato fruits after harvest and highlights the existence of substantial cultivar-to-cultivar variation in the postharvest evolution of the considered traits according to maturity stage at harvest and in response to postharvest manipulations. It also suggests the need for adapting postharvest procedures to the characteristics of each particular genotype to preserve the optimal quality of the fresh product.