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Researcher develops confectionery with fruit by-products from the Atlantic Forest

Dragee sweets in the form of bars and gum are produced with residues of uvaia, cambuci and grumixama

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Confectionery is often considered a villain in healthy eating due to the amount of sugar, flavorings and artificial colorings it contains. But drageed confectionery, gummy bears and fruit bars (made from pulp) can actually come close to products that are good for your health. This was proven by a doctoral thesis defended at the Faculty of Food Engineering (FEA) at Unicamp and developed at the Fruit and Vegetable Laboratory of the Department of Food Technology (DTA). By adding waste from the processing of fruits from the Atlantic Forest to sweets, researcher Kazumi Kawasaki Ramos was able to develop products with a pleasant flavor and that maintain bioactive compounds, with antioxidant characteristics, in addition to fiber. The products passed sensory tests.

Photo: Antoninho Perri
 Researcher Kazumi Kawasaki Ramos, author of the thesis: “We hope that with this research we can encourage the use of waste”

Kazumi and her advisor, Priscilla Efraim, chose to work with three fruits: cambuci, grumixama and uvaia, all produced without the use of pesticides, on a farm in Paraibuna, São Paulo. The fruits are used in the manufacture of frozen pulp and had their by-products such as peels, pomace and seeds discarded until then. The first step of the work was to choose the best drying condition for the waste and its transformation into powder, to be added to confectionery recipes. “Our intention was to provide a destination for this waste that still has a large amount of fiber, nutrients and interesting compounds for food”, she says.

For each fruit chosen, Kazumi developed three types of confectionery that were then subjected to sensory analysis. The fruit bar, which is normally made from pulp, sugar and pectin, was made with the by-product instead of pulp or a mixture of pulp and by-product, sugar and a substance called pectin. The gummy candy was made only with by-products or pulp.

The drageed confections also received two versions: with filling by-products and covered in chocolate or covered in cupulate, which is a product similar to chocolate made from the cupuaçu almond, also considered a residue in the pulp industry. “In general, we came to the conclusion that the most interesting alternative for adding by-products to confectionery, from the point of view of sensory analysis, would be mixing the by-products with the fruit pulp”, he added.

Photo: Antoninho Perri
The sweets were tested and developed in the Fruits and Vegetables Laboratory of the Department of Food Technology

Kazumi sought to work with a small producer in the Paraibuna region. “There are many small producers in the region. We hope that with this research we will be able to encourage the use of waste and the full use of the fruit.” Another benefit of the research, according to her, is the possible incentive for the planting of these fruits, with the reforestation of devastated areas of the Atlantic Forest.

 

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Photo: Antoninho Perri

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