Lemon juice vesicles have abundant flavor components that can undergo complex changes during drying. Three drying methods, including integrated freeze-drying (IFD), conventional freeze-drying (CFD), and hot-air drying (AD), were studied to determine their effects on the dynamic changes in the flavor compounds in lemon juice vesicles. Compared with the fresh samples, the final dried samples that underwent IFD, CFD, and AD lost seven, seven, and six volatile flavor compounds and three, four, and five amino acids, respectively; the order of the loss ratios with respect to the volatile compound content was: 82.73% in CFD > 71.22% in IFD > 28.78% in AD. AD resulted in the highest total amino acid content (10.83 ± 0.20 mg/g), which was 1.39 and 5.54 mg/g higher than that of IFD and CFD, respectively; CFD resulted in the highest total organic acid content (45.94 ± 0.34 mg/g), which was 8.01 and 7.87 mg/g higher than that of IFD and AD, respectively; and AD contributed to the highest total soluble sugars (17.12 ± 0.20 mg/g), which was 1.24 and 1.49 mg/g higher than that of IFD and CFD, respectively. A correlation analysis demonstrated that most of the amino acids and the soluble sugars were closely related to the profiles of the volatile compounds in the lemon juice vesicles during drying.
Keywords: hot-air drying; lemon juice vesicles; nonvolatile flavor compounds; vacuum freeze-drying; volatile flavor compounds.