Firmness and cell wall characteristics of pasteurized jalapeno pepper rings as affected by calcium chloride and rotary processing

Rotary processing resulted in more uniform heat: penetration and texture re tention throughout the container than resulted after nonagitated processing . Localized softening in nonagitated peppers was due to prolonged heating a t the top of the container, which-hydrolyzed large molecular weight pectic substances (chelator and nonextractable) to more soluble forms. Calcium imp roved the texture by maintaining greater levels of insoluble pectic substan ces (chelator, dilute alkali and nonextractable) and reducing pectin solubi lization, The combination of rotary processing and calcium chloride treatme nt resulted in a product with fresh-like, uniform texture throughout the co ntainer.