SHORT-TIME-STORAGE OF CARROTS AND PROCESSING BY DRYING

Carrots damaged or deformed during growth or harvesting, resp., cannot be used for long-time-storage. If there is a high sensibility for parasitic diseases those carrots will cause an early and high damage in the whole charge of a storage. Therefore, carrots not suitable for long-time-storage are often left back on the field after harvesting.

Thus we have been investigating the following problems:

1. Is it possible to store carrots of lower quality for a short time?
2. Can they be processed by (warm) air drying?

To 1.

Depending on variety and degree of damage carrots of lower quality can be stored up to 2 months without higher losses.

To 2.

Carrots were dried by warm air at temperatures between 30°C and 200°C. At the temperature of 30°C the carotene content decreased from 210 mg/100 g dry matter to 180 mg. At the temperature of 50°C or 75°C a decrease to 160 mg or 120 mg, resp., occurred. Still higher temperatures, however, proved to be unfavourable. From the economical point of view the combination of short-time-storage with drying processes seems to be favourable. Dried chips made from carrots of lower quality are a valuable additional food for horses.