Comparative study on natural drying and hot-air drying of abalone

Abalone was dried in natural air or hot air. The two drying methods were compared in several aspects as follows: the drying rate, color, flavor components, and microstructure of the product. The results show that the two methods have a similar process: a short-time rising rate period and following a falling rate period. When drying processes were finished, hot-air drying just cost half of the time of solar drying. Both of the two dried abalones have significant increase comparing with boiled abalone in the content of flavor amino acids. The hot-air dried abalone has a bigger advantage than abalone dried in natural air. Abalone dried in hot air had stronger browning reaction than that in natural drying sample. The microstructure of the two dried abalone meat has significantly differences: muscle fiber of natural drying abalone is shrank equably and compactly, while the fiber of hot-air drying abalone is distorted badly and lots of big holes appear in the muscle. In one word, compared with the traditional natural drying method, the hot-air drying has advantages and can replace it.