Fresh Keeping of Cut Watermelon by Hurdle Technology

In India fruits and vegetables are bought from local market, washed with water, and either eaten raw or cooked. However, in a metropolis like Delhi and Mumbai, a number of street vendors serve pre-cut fruits and salads that are cut in the morning and handled in unhygienic conditions. When vegetables and fruits are peeled, sliced, diced, etc., it has been assumed that the tissue wounded causes accelerated loss of nutritional value just as other physiological and biochemical reactions leading to undesirable quality changes. Moreover, a study on the fresh leafy vegetables, salad components and ready-to-eat salads were found with high coliform counts. This book includes an introduction to raw & cut watermelon, its shelf life and other physiologically related horticultural crops, and method to enhance the shelf life of cut watermelon by use of natural antimicrobials applied through hurdle technology for various physico-chemical, microbial and sensory characteristics. Therefore, this book will be very important to professionals in the field of agriculture, food science & nutrition to understand the postharvest life of horticultural crops especially cut watermelon.