Effect of osmotic dehydration pretreatment and glassy state storage on the quality attributes of frozen mangoes under long-term storage

Changes in the quality of frozen mango cuboids were investigated during long-term glassy state storage with and without osmotic dehydration pretreatment. The mango cuboids were dehydrated in mixed solutions (sucrose: glucose: fructose in a ratio of 3.6:1:3) of different concentrations (30, 40, and 50% (wt/wt)) prior to freezing and then stored at −55 °C (in the glassy state) for 6 months. The results revealed that compared with the untreated samples, osmotic pretreatment decreased total color difference (reduced by 15.6–62.3%), drip loss (reduced by 8.2–29.5%) and titration acidity (reduced by 1.3–9.4%), while increasing hardness (increased by 48.8–82.3%), vitamin C content (increased by 72.5–120.6%) and total soluble solids (increased by 21.8–53.7%) of frozen mangoes after 6 months. Dehydration with a sugar concentration of 40% was considered as the optimal pretreatment condition. In addition, a storage temperature of −55 °C provided better retention of quality than rubbery state storage at −18 °C. With prolonged storage time, the quality of frozen mangoes continued to change, even in the glassy state. However, the changes in quality of the osmotic-dehydrated samples were less than those of the untreated samples. The current work indicates that osmotic pretreatment and glassy state storage significantly improved the quality of frozen mangoes during long-term storage.