Effect of Different Drying Techniques on Quality Attributes of Ready to Reconstitute (RTR) Coffee Mix

Coffee is one of the most ubiquitous and culturally significant beverages worldwide, transcending borders and influencing societies in myriad ways. Ready-to-reconstitute (RTR) coffee, often referred to as instant coffee, occupies a unique and significant niche in the global coffee market. In the present study, A mixture of Arabica to Robusta coffee beans in the ratio of 70:30 was found most suitable for manufacture of ready to reconstitute coffee mix. The concentrated coffee decoction prepared using this mixture is to be blended with concentrated milk (30%TS) in the ratio of 1:5 and dried using vacuum tray dryer, tray dryer and freeze dryer. The coffee mix is vacuum-dried at 30 to 45 degrees Celsius with a vacuum of 600 to 650 mm of Hg, gives better quality of dried product. The optimized final product has better rheological and physico chemical characteristics. In present study found that ready to reconstitute coffee mix has solubility in hot water 26.4 seconds and 2.74 minutes in cold water at 16◦C. The freeze-dried coffee mix powder exhibited reduced flowability 42.08 seconds compare to vacuum try dried and tray-dried coffee mix power that was 47.41 and 46.27 seconds respectively. Same as bulk density of freeze-dried powder (0.64 g/cm3) found lowest compare to vacuum tray dried (0.78 g/cm3) and tray dried (0.82 g/cm3) coffee mix powder.