RESEARCH OF OPTIMIZED TECHNOLOGY OF SUNFLOWER OIL PRODUCTION AND PRODUCT QUALITY INDICATORS

Abstract

The aim of the work is to study the quality of unrefined sunflower oil made by optimized technology. The experimental work involved the modernization of technological equipment during pressing and filtration and optimization of parameters. In the process of production of unrefined sunflower oil it is promising to use pre-pressing by performing it on MP-68 forepresses at a pressure in the middle part of the gap space of 1.67–2.23 MPa to obtain 60–85% of forepressed oil and forepressed oilcake, which is later sent for additional extraction of oil. The audit showed that the improvement requires the separation of inhomogeneous systems (suspensions). This is possible when using special filter baffles, which pass the liquid phase (oil) and retain the solid one (wax). Additionally, special auxiliary filter means are used, which role consists in protection of a filter partition against blockage of pores, maintaining a high filtration rate and ensuring the required purity of the filtrate. Analysis of organoleptic and physicochemical parameters of unrefined sunflower oil made by classical and optimized technology, which included the use of advanced perforated rollers for grinding, improving the parameters of forepressing and modified filter baffles (2nd method), proved the effectiveness of these techniques as the products met the requirements of the state standard. It was found that our proposed approaches provided a mass fraction of non-fat impurities of not more than 0.028%, and the degree of transparency of not more than 26.1 fem. Product safety is confirmed by microbiological indicators of oil: the number of aerobic and facultative-anaerobic microorganisms did not exceed 381 CFU/g (norm – 500). The application of advanced raw material processing technology has increased the production efficiency and the quality of oil products.