Original article Effect of heat treatment and individual shrink packaging on quality and nutritional value of bell pepper stored at suboptimal temperature Zoran S. Ilic ´, 1 * Radmila Trajkovic ´, 2 Rados ˇ Pavlovic ´, 3 Sharon Alkalai-Tuvia, 4 Yaacov Perzelan 4 & Elazar Fallik 4 1 Faculty of Agriculture, Prisˇtina-Lesˇak, 38219 Lesˇak, Serbia 2 Faculty of Natural Sciences and Mathematics, Department of Biology, 38220 Kos, Mitrovica, Serbia 3 Faculty of Agriculture, Cara Dusˇana 32, C ˇ acˇak, Serbia 4 ARO-The Volcani Center, Department of Postharvest Science of Fresh Produce, Israel (Received 15 March 2011; Accepted in revised form 21 August 2011) Summary The goal of this study was to develop a technology for prolonged storage of pepper fruit at low temperature, based on physical treatments and packaging materials. Physical and compositional changes of red bell pepper fruit (Capsicum annuum L. cv.’Selika’) were monitored during 21 days of cold storage (at 2 °C) plus 3 days at 20 °C (market simulation). Fruits were treated with tap and hot water and stored without packaging or sealing each fruit in individual shrink packaging (CryovacÒ). This research revealed that individual shrink packaging following prestorage with hot water rinse (55 °C for 15 s) over brushes, significantly reduced weight loss, softening, decay incidence and chilling injury, while maintaining a quality. The wrapped fruit ripened normally (carotenoid content increased) during shelf-life period, when shifted to 20 °C after unwrapping. This study showed that antioxidant levels of pepper fruit may be preserved during storage. Keywords Cold storage, heat treatment, pepper, quality, shrink wrapping. Introduction Sweet cultivars of Capsicum annuum L. are important not only because of the large amount consumed but also because of their high health and nutritional contributions to humans (Materska & Perucka, 2005). It is a very perishable vegetable with a short shelf-life. Common inherent postharvest problems of pepper fruits after harvesting include significant metabolic and physiological activities, quality degradation and shrivelling, as well as fast physical decay and rapid senescence (Bayoumi, 2008). The most effective method of maintaining quality and controlling decay of peppers is by rapid cooling after harvest followed by storage at optimum temperature (7–10 °C) with a high relative humidity 95–98% (Kader, 2002). The storage life of pepper fruit is limited by pathological deterioration (Ceponis et al., 1987), rapid water loss (Diaz-Perez et al., 2007) and susceptibility to chilling injury (Fallik et al., 2009), which limits storage to temperatures above 7 °C (Paull, 1990). Pepper fruit cannot be stored at the low temperatures necessary to slow physiological activ- ities (rate of respiration, ripening, etc.), because of chilling injury development, and so heat treatment and shrink-wrapped fruit is of great potential benefit. Prestorage hot water dipping of fruit has been investi- gated as a way of enhancing fruit resistance to chilling injury (Lurie, 1998). Hot water rinsing while brushing (HWRB) bell peppers immediately after harvest at 55 °C for 12 s significantly reduced decay incidence, while maintaining fruit quality, compared with un- treated fruit (Fallik et al., 1999). Postharvest heat treatments have been reported to induce fruit tolerance to cold temperature and to reduce the development of chilling injury symptoms during cold storage (Bar- Yosef et al., 2009; Fallik et al., 2009). Another way to reduce chilling injury is by using plastic materials. Polyethylene bag packaging has been confirmed to be a useful tool for postharvest pepper quality maintenance, by preventing water loss and fruit softening (Meir et al., 1995), without producing noticeable adverse effects on the majority of the examined compositional quality parameters, and without enhancing postharvest diseases (Raffo et al., 2007). Film wrapping has also been *Correspondent: E-mail: zoran_ilic63@yahoo.com International Journal of Food Science and Technology 2012, 47, 83–90 83 doi:10.1111/j.1365-2621.2011.02810.x Ó 2011 The Authors. International Journal of Food Science and Technology Ó 2011 Institute of Food Science and Technology