Description

Sweet potato is an important root crop grown all over the world and consumed as a vegetable, boiled, baked or often fermented into food and beverages. Fresh sweet potato fruit contains about 70 to 72 % (wb) moisture content. There are more chances of the sweet potato getting spoiled or deteriorated. Also, sweet potato is a perishable root, it has shelf life of 2 to 3 weeks and marketing of sweet potatoes to different places is also one of major constraint, as about 35 % post-harvest losses occur during post-harvest management. Therefore, it is necessary to convert it into value added products which retain color, flavor and nutrients with longer shelf life. So, to increase the shelf life of sweet potato, it is converted into various processed products like flour, dried slices, dried chips, RTS, beverages, etc. Sweet potato flour is used in cakes, biscuits, noodles, jam, jellies, sauces, fortified flour, juices, wines, ice-cream, alcohol, industrial starch and crackies and other dishes etc.