Heat toxicant contaminant mitigation in potato chips

•The effect of blanching over furan, acrylamide and oil contents in potato chips was studied.•Blanching reduces acrylamide (54%), furan (91%) and oil (19%) contents in potato chips.•Optimum blanching conditions in the experimental region studied were 64 °C and17 min.•Blanching process may be considered as an alternative unit operation to produce healthier potato chips.

Heating foods immersed in oil during frying provides many attractive sensorial attributes including taste, flavor and color. However, some toxic compounds formed during frying of potatoes such as furan and acrylamide may constitute an increased cancer risk for consumers. The objective of this work was to mitigate the furan and acrylamide formation in potato chips without increasing their oil uptake by optimizing the blanching treatment before final frying. Potato slices were blanched in order to simultaneously leach out ascorbic acid and reducing sugars, the most important precursors of furan and acrylamide generation in thermally treated starchy foods. A central composite design was implemented to optimize the temperature-time blanching conditions under which furan, acrylamide and oil content in potato chips were minimized. The optimum blanching conditions were 64 °C and 17 min in which significant reductions of furan, acrylamide and oil content (91%, 54% and 19% respectively) were reached.