Continuous flow microwave processing of peanut butter: A (hypothetical) computational process design study with experimental validation

Abstract

The increase in foodborne pathogen cases in low moisture foods has raised a significant food safety concern for food industry. One of the most significant outbreaks related with these food products was observed in 2008-2009 due to Salmonella problem in peanut butter. This issue was recently observed again for a multinational case. Challenges of conventional thermal processing due to the lower thermal conductivity - diffusivity value and higher viscosity, microwave (MW) heating might be an efficient processing while the non-uniform heating is a challenging drawback. Therefore, the objective of this study was to develop a mathematical model for MW processing of peanut butter and present industrial scale designs for continuous flow processing. For this purpose, the mathematical model was first experimentally validated using a lab-scale system and validated with experi-mental data. Following this, continuous flow MW process design studies were carried out with different holding tube configurations to obtain a temperature increase to enable decontamination and improve the temperature uniformity. These design simulations provided a better understanding to enhance the process efficiency of high viscosity low moisture peanut butter samples and for design and optimization of continuous flow MW processing.