The effect of ratio between Tilapia fish (Oreochromis niloticus) and Otoshimi on properties of sago fish crackers

Fish crackers are deep fried crackers normally made using fish and starch, and is a well known snack in South East Asia. Formulation of the fish crackers plays an important role not just in the quality of the product, but also for branding. In this study, fish formulation using tilapia and otoshimi was used which was added with sago as the starch base. A tilapia-based formulation of 1:1 with Sago showed good puffing with the highest expansion percentage at 4.21±0.66 and lowered hardness (2832.0±437.97 N/cm2) compared to the other formulations. Meanwhile, although increase expansion was associated with increase oil absorption, the 1:1 ratio of tilapia to sago had lower oil absorption percentage (4.20±0.86) compared to increasing sago in the formulation (1:1:4, Tilapia, Otoshimi, Sago which had oil absorption percentage of 6.53±3.22 %, and 1:0:2 which had oil absorption percentage of 5.50±1.37). Although the overall quality does not reflect a good quality cracker, it was interesting to note that tilapia alone with sago showed better expansion, low oil absorption and reduce hardness.