Effect of drying method and bad thickness on physical, chemical, and organoleptic quality of dry herbal Moringa (Moringa oleifera) leaves

Bengkulu University, Department of Agricultural Technology, Faculty of Agriculture, Bengkulu, Indonesia

^* Corresponding author: yuwana@unib.ac.id

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to determine the effect of the drying method and bed thickness on the physical quality test (moisture content, color), chemical (ash content, flavonoids, total phenol, carotenoids, ascorbic acid, or vitamin C and antioxidant activity) and organoleptic test of Moringa leaf tea. The experimental research was a Split Plot Design with dryers as the main plot and bed thickness as a subplot. Analysis of variance (ANOVA) and Duncan's Multiple Range Test (DMRT) at a significant level of 5% was used to analyze the experimental data. The organoleptic scores were analyzed using the Friedman test. The ANOVA results indicated that the drying method significantly affected whereas the bed thickness did not influence the experimental parameters. The best result in terms of herbal moisture content (5.94%) and color was obtained by YSD UNIB 2022 assisted with a fan. The highest ash content was in the range of 7.78 % -7%, total phenol was 50.78 GAE/g, carotenoids content was 17, 57 mg/g, ascorbic acid (vitamin C) was 117, 33%, and the strongest (antioxidant activity) was at an IC50 value of 37.85 ppm. The best (flavonoids) showed a red color on drying YSD UNIB12.