Strawberries are harvested in a short period of time frequently involving fruit surplus. This paper studies the impact of the strawberry purée elaboration process on the chemical composition of the final products. Thirty-two phenolic compounds were studied by Liquid Chromatography with Diode Array Detector (LC-DAD) and Mass Spectrometry (LC-MS). An LC-DAD method was set up and validated and the non-anthocyanin phenolic profile was quantified at the different steps of production, for three elaboration processes and two harvests (2011 and 2012). We have tentatively identified apigenin-7-O-glucoside, luteolin-3-O-glucuronide, malonyl caffeoylquinic acid, trans-resveratrol glucoside and caffeoylglucaric isomer. (+)-Catechin and HHDP-galloylglucose were the most abundant phenolic compounds. The most abundant flavonol was kaempferol-3-glucoside. The purée maintains the fruit's non-anthocyanin phenolic composition and in vitro antioxidant activity as determined by ORAC and DPPH methods. This fact suggests that strawberry purée could be considered a valuable ingredient for producing food derivatives.
Keywords: Antioxidant activity; Liquid chromatography; Mass Spectrometry; Polyphenols; Strawberry; Validation.
Copyright © 2014. Published by Elsevier Ltd.