Abstract

The aim of this work was to analyze the quality of red abalone dehydrated under osmotic vacuum impregnation (OVI) as a pretreatment to the convection drying process. Response surface methodology was used to optimize osmotic impregnation conditions. Then, diffusional parameters of salt (Dse) and water (Dwe), the drying kinetics, and quality characteristics were analyzed. According to the RSM, the optimized impregnation conditions were 92 mbar at 20% NaCl for 14 min. The Dse and Dwe diffusion parameters for OVI were 7.72 and 4.14 × 10–10 (m2/s), respectively. The drying kinetics of the OVI sample obtained a higher Dwe value than conventional impregnation. The quality showed a more tenderness product, higher rehydration and water holding capacity and less non-enzymatic browning and color change. Therefore, OVI is a promising alternative to conventional impregnation, the method currently used for pretreatment seafood which requires a long processing time. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature.