Effects of Salt Concentration on Storage Ability of Sauerkraut

Abstract

A research study was conducted, to evaluate the physicochemical properties and quality of spontaneously fermented cabbage at five NaCl salt concentrations: 1.0%, 2%, 3%, 4%, 5% (w/w) were used as treatments and 0% (w/w) NaCl was used as control with 4 weeks of storage period. For this study, Brassica oleracea L. was shredded, salted and packed into glass jars and kept under anaerobic conditions for fermentation at 29°C±2 for 7 days. After initial fermentation physico-chemical analysis vz-pH, titratable acidity, total soluble solids(TSS), total sugars(TS), ascorbic acid, moisture and ash content and sensory evaluation was conducted and based on the scores, most preferred three formulations T2, T3, T4 were selected for storage study at ambient conditions for 4 weeks. The physico-chemical analysis of stored sauerkraut samples revealed an increasing trend in titratable acidity (0.21-0.7%), TSS (18.94-110.51mg/kg) and decreasing trend in pH (5.72-3.94), moisture (90.84-83.86%), ash (3.51-2.94%) and vitamin C content (0.41-0.08 mg/kg), and TS was observed increasing on week 1 and shown a decreasing trend in the later part (45.21-37.85mg/kg). The sensory assessment revealed that there was significant increase in overall acceptability for the treatments with 2-3% salt solution in colour, aroma and taste, and all the salted treatments were observed for microbial test. At the end of the study, sauerkraut prepared with 3% NaCl was preferred for desirable nutritive values up to 21 days at ambient storage.