Newly proposed harvest method, branch-cut harvest for Aralia elata extends cold storage life and maintains the quality of edible shoots
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<i>Aralia elata</i> which is called “Dureup” in Korea, is one of the indigenous species in Korea having 1-6 m height, 8-10 cm root collar diameter with brown-gray bark and canary yellow fresh branches and sparse fine thorns. The edible young shoot of <i>A. elata</i> is well-known for its high nutrients and medicinal effects which is helpful to human health. In despite of the nutritional advantages, it is hard to store more than one week in cold storage due to its vigorous metabolic activities after harvest. The objective of this study was to examine the effects of branch-cut harvest method on shoot quality characteristics and storability compared with the shoot harvested with conventional method. The harvest method was divided into two conditions; 1) shoot was nipped off with hands, named shoot harvest (SH) and 2) 5 cm of branch cut with the shoot using pruning scissor, named shoot with branch-cut harvest (SBH).<br /> The bunches of shoots from each harvesting method were collected into plastic boxes and then stored at 3±1 °C for 7 weeks.<br /> After 4 weeks of storage, weight loss of SH (17.1%) was about two-fold higher than SBH (9.1%). Additionally, water content of SH decreased 81.9% to 75.9%, while SBH showed 81.9% at harvest and 80.5% after 4 weeks. Lightness of shoot leaves in SH was lower than SBH during whole storage period. Wilt, decay and off-odor index (0-5) showed 1.2, 5.0 and 0.7 in SH while 3.8, 3.8 and 3.7 in SBH after 4 weeks, respectively. Overall quality index (0-15) was rapidly decreasing 15.0 to 7.3 in SH while SBH slightly reduced 15.0 to 12.2 after 4 weeks. These results indicate that the quality of A. elata shoot mainly affected by wilt and off-odor index after harvesting.<br /> In conclusion, it is able to maintain product quality for 4 weeks after harvest to use the SBH method, which is a remarkable extension storage life of <i>A. elata</i>.
Keywords: Food systems, Human health and well-being, Innovation, Research, Value chain
ID: 3622939