Heat and mass transfer in deep fat frying of breaded chicken nugget

This study presents techniques that can be applied to optimize the quality of coated fried chicken nuggets.;Heat and mass transfer during deep fat frying of breaded chicken nugget was simultaneously modeled using the moving boundary concept. Numerical software FEMLABRTM 3.0 was used to solve the proposed model. To validate the model, experiments were conducted. Chicken nuggets were made with wheat flour based batter and breading. The samples were fried in a fryer using oil temperatures at 160, 170 and 180°C. Total frying times ranged from 90 to 300 s. A good agreement was obtained between predicted and observed results.;During the deep-frying process, the chicken nuggets samples shrank because of moisture loss and protein denaturation. Particle density and bulk volume shrinkage were analyzed at 3 different frying temperatures (160, 170 and 180°C). Particle density and shrinkage of the samples was measured using the liquid displacement technique with water. A linear relation was found for particle densities with moisture loss. The relationship between volumetric shrinkage and moisture loss was also found to be linear and the linear equation may be useful in predicting the volumetric shrinkage during frying.;In order to reduce the oil absorption of chicken nuggets during the frying process, the influence of pretreatment in microwave on the moisture and oil transfer in the coating and core layers of coated chicken nuggets were studied. Chicken nuggets pretreated in a microwave oven for 1 or 2 min were fried at 160°C for times ranging from 90 to 300 s to evaluate oil transfer. Microwave pretreatment had an important effect on moisture loss and oil uptake of chicken nuggets during deep-fat frying.