The Use of Edible Coatings to Preserve Quality of Fresh Cut Kiwi Fruits (Ready to Eat)

THE AIM of the current study was to evaluate the effect of gelatin and Aloe vera coating on physicochemical, microbial, and sensorial properties of fresh-cut kiwi fruits stored at 4±1°C for 12 days.The slices of kiwi fruit were covered with gelatin and/or Aleo vera gel whilet he uncoated samples were served as control.The kiwi fruit slices were packaged and cold stored. Quality attributes such as weight loss, firmness,total soluble solids,vitamin C, pH, titratable acidity, microbial load and sensory properties were evaluated during storage. Our results highlighted that an Aloe vera coating improved the quality of stored kiwi fruit slices. The best results obtained in the instrumental firmness and in the preference panel test were with the mixture ofgelatinandAleovera gel (5:100) and Aleo vera gel only. Significant differences in terms of quality parameters were observed between the control and coated fresh-cut kiwi fruits.The highest variation of quality parameters was observed in the control, while the lowest variations were noticed in coated slices with gelatin and Aleo vera gel mixture (5:100) and withAleo vera gel alone. The weight loss increased with storage time, but the coating treatment especially with gelatin and Aleo vera gel (5:100) had significant effect on decreasing weight loss. Also, the same samples had the best microbiological quality and were ranked the highest scores for sensory evaluation.