Ohmic heating: A promising technology to reduce furan formation in sterilized vegetable and vegetable/meat baby foods

- Ohmic heating was tested as an alternative way for vegetable puree sterilization.
- Ohmic heating proved to form less furan, comparing to retort sterilization.
- Other heat induced changes are also reduced in puree treated by ohmic heating.
- Better freshness of puree can be obtained by ohmic heating.

Occurrence of furan, classified as carcinogen 2B by the International Agency for Research on Cancer, in heat-processed foods, especially sterilized baby foods, is of a health concern. On this account, innovative processing practices ensuring microbial safety, acceptable sensorial features, and, at the same time, minimizing furan formation have to be searched. In this study, the potential of ohmic heating to mitigate furan formation was demonstrated. Compared to conventional retort sterilization, significant mitigation (70-90%) of furan was achieved, assumingly due to reduced degradation of furan precursor under faster terms heating conditions. In purees containing meat, approx. two times less furan was formed, regardless of the processing technology. In addition to furan, also other headspace volatiles were measured and statistically evaluated. Compounds originated through fatty acids oxidation and Maillard reaction products were more abundant in conventionally sterilized samples compared to those treated by ohmic heating.Industrial relevanceOhmic heating is an emerging technology being employed in the field of food processing which applies a direct electric current to food products, providing rapid and uniform heating throughout the product. Shorter heating times used in ohmic heating, as compared to conventional retort sterilization, reduce potential losses of valuable nutrients and as well as reduce the formation of undesirable processing contaminants, in particular furan.The presented work examines furan concentrations across various stages of baby food production, in order to compare ohmic heating and retort sterilization processes. Volatile compound fingerprints for baby food purees processed via both sterilization methods, both prior and post sterilization were assessed. The results presented in this work are of high potential interest to the baby food industry to reduce both heat induced chemical changes and exposure of infants and babies to hazardous processing contaminants such as furan.