Avocado: Composition and processing technologies

Abstract

Avocado (Persea Americana Mill) production has a significant impact on the economy and society being considered as one of the main crops worldwide. It has highly valuated sensorial characteristics and is recognized as a healthy fruit. Between the healthbenefits from its consumption, draws attention the dyslipidemia improvement; this effect has been tightly related with flesh chemical characteristics as the high content of unsaturated fatty acids, and the presence of functional compounds as sterols, carotenes and tocopherols. This fruit is produced mainly for fresh consumption. But, in the last years, the world production of avocado is raising continuously, with a concurrent increase in the rejected grade fruit. México is the leading producer and exporter, in this country, less than the fifth part of the production is destined to industrialization. This percentage includes lower quality grade fruit, smaller sized avocados, and fruit that does not qualify for human consumption as a fresh product because of the level of surface damage. Successful and popular foods such as pure and more recently, extra virgin oil, are made from the edible fraction of avocado. However, with the increase of alternatives based on avocado flesh, problems as the short time of maturation and easy oxidation are more critical for producers. Those concerns lead to the need for improving the existing technology, and to develop new alternatives for avocado processing to preserve or enhance sensorial and functional characteristics.