Modeling oil uptake of potato strips pretreated with ultrasound, microwave and osmotic dehydration during deep-fat frying process

The objective of this study was to evaluate the effect of process conditions and different pretreatments including ultrasound، microwave and osmotic dehydration on mass transfer and oil uptake during deep fat frying of potato slices. Ultrasound pretreatment was performed at frequency of 40 KHz for 10 and 30 minutes، microwave pretreatment was conducted at 5 W/g power and osmotic dehydration pretreatment was done in NaCl solutions with concentrations of 1 and 3 percent. Potato slices were then fried at 150، 170 and 190°C for 90، 180، 270 and 360 seconds. The results showed that ultrasound pretreatment for 10 minutes increases oil uptake of samples as compared with control sample، but when samples were exposed to ultrasound for 30 minutes، oil uptake was decreased. In addition، microwave pretreatment reduced oil uptake of potato slices insignificantly. Furthermore، osmotic dehydration pretreatment reduced oil uptake. In order to model oil uptake، experimental data were fitted with 6 models. The aforementioned models had the highest R2 and a minimum value of RMSE.