ARAÚJO, Fernanda de Sousa.
Resumo:
In food analysis, and one of the most important parameters is the estimated water content or humidity. The methods for their determination are fundamentally based on the drying of the sample and associated with, so with weight loss. Dairy products belong to the group of foods including milk and usually have considerable humidity, and control is essential to ensure the quality of these products. The aim of this study was to compare the moisture determination results obtained through the drying methods under glass, microwave oven and balance with infrared samples of fresh ricotta, grated parmesan cheese, cream cheese, cheese Petit Suisse, full UHT milk partially skimmed yogurt, skim milk fermented and fermented milk drink. From the results obtained for the different dairy products analyzed, it is clear a difference between the values in the comparison of analytical methods. When comparing the methods of drying in oven and microwave use, it was observed that the analyzed product showed similar values, but did not receive grated Parmesan cheese moisture content close to these drying methods. The same can not be said of the infrared which resulted in very distant and lower values obtained in other methods among the tested products.