PHYSICAL AND CHEMICAL CHARACTERISTICS OF PINEAPPLES GROWN IN BANGLADESH

Pineapple is widely taken for fresh consumption as well as their flesh and juice are used for preparation of different product in agro-processing industries. For such industrial processes, it is important to have the information of the physical and chemical properties of pineapple. Four varieties of pineapple, eg., Honey Queen (HQ), Giant Kew (GK), Asshini and Ghorasal were collected from the districts of Tangail, Sylhet and Narsinghdi. . Physical and chemical properties such as weight, length, diameter, color, odor, firmness, appearances, sweetness, moisture content, ash, edible portion and total soluble solids (TSS), pH, titrable acidity (TA), total sugar, reducing sugar, ascorbic acid of pineapple juice were analyzed in this study. This study examined the sensory quality of the pineapples. The firmness of pineapple fruits measured in outside and inside to be 0.21 to 0.27 N/m² and 0.06 to 0.10 N/m² respectively. The pH values of the four varieties were found to be in the range of 4.30 to 4.36. The highest and lowest sweetness index was estimated to be 36.30 for honey queen and 22.15 for asshini. The highest and lowest magnitude of sugar contents of four pineapple varieties were found to be in the range of 14.16 to 15.8 mg/100g. The average TSS values were found to be 15.12%, 12.33%, 13.14% and 12.95% for HQ, GK, asshini and ghorashal, respectively. So the comparative study indicated that the honey queen is superior to rest of the varieties of pineapple irrespective of nutritional content as well as sweetness.