ABSTRACT
Dehydration is one the oldest food preservation techniques known to man. The primary objective of dehydration is the prevention of occurrence of dangerous or undesirable changes due to activity of microorganisms. This objective is attained by reducing the water activity below the threshold of relevant microbial activity. The reduction of water content and water activity may also have the beneficial effect of reducing the probability of nonmicrobial changes in quality, in particular those due to enzyme action, to nonenzymatic browning, and to hydrolytic reactions. The effect of water activity on these deteriorative changes were discussed in some detail in Chapter 6.
