Pumpkin processing steps
The main steps include: raw material cleaning, finishing and cutting, soaking and bleaching, dehydration and packaging. Choose those kind of pumpkins with good flavor, smooth skin, and orange-red flesh.
1 cleaning
Wash the pumpkin in clean water.
2 removing impurities
Remove the fruit band from the washed pumpkin, then divide it in half with a knife, and peel off the outer skin, inner melon petals, and seeds. Cut it into 3-4mm or 6-7mm slices.
3 blanching
Treat the cut melon slices with steam or boiling water for 1-3 minutes. Cool it quickly with cold water and drain off the water.
Pumpkin drying process
Pumpkin slices: Put the blanched pumpkin slices into the drying room for drying. The drying temperature firstly should be controlled at 45°C-60°C, and then gradually increased, but it cannot exceed 70°C. Drying the pumpkin until the moisture content is below 6%. the dehydrated pumpkin slices should be pale yellow or orange-red, shaped in flaky or filamentous.
Pumpkin Powder: Dehydrating the pumpkin and controls the moisture content of the pumpkin products at 14%. afterwards, it will be puffed and crushed to prepare pumpkin powder. When it become a pumpkin slice, use a pulverizer to make the pumpkin slice into a power form, sieve it through a 60-80 mesh sieve, and then carry out aseptic packaging in a vacuum packaging machine or use a composite plastic powder food bag for packaging. Then, it will produce the edible pumpkin powder.