The objective of this work was to optimize pulsed electric field (PEF) or ohmic heating (OH) application for carrot and apple mashes treatment at different preheating temperatures (40, 60 or 80 °C). The effect of tissue disintegration on the properties of recovered juices was quantified, taking into account the colour change, the antioxidant activity and the enzyme activity of peroxidase (POD) in both carrot and apple juice and polyphenol oxidase (PPO) in apple juice. Lower ΔE and an increase of the antioxidant activity were obtained for juice samples treated with temperature at 80 °C with or without PEF and OH pretreatment compared with those of untreated samples. The inactivation by 90% for POD and PPO was achieved when a temperature of 80 °C was applied for both carrot and apple mash. A better retention of plant secondary metabolites from carrot and apple mashes could be achieved by additional PEF or OH application. Obtained results are the basis for the development of targeted processing concepts considering the release, inactivation and retention of ingredients.

Gluten-free (GF) batters usually present several technological challenges that limit the performance during conventional baking and the resulting product quality. Due to the volumetric heating principle and faster heating rates, ohmic heating (OH) may be advantageous compared with conventional baking. Therefore, the potential of using ohmic heating as a novel approach for gluten-free bread baking was explored. In detail, the effect of different OH process parameters (power input, holding time) on the chemical and functional properties (specific volume, crumb firmness and relative elasticity, pore properties, color, starch gelatinization) and digestibility of breads was investigated. Results showed that GF breads could benefit from the uniform rapid heating during processing, as these breads showed superior functional properties (specific volume, 2.86–3.44 cm³/g; relative elasticity, 45.05–56.83%; porosity, 35.17–40.92%) compared with conventional oven-baked GF bread (specific volume, 2.60 cm³/g; relative elasticity, 44.23%; porosity, 37.63%). In order to maximize bread expansion and the OH performance, it was found that the OH process could be improved by applying the electrical energy in three descending power steps: first step with high power input (in this study, 2–6 kW for 15 s), followed by 1 kW for 10 s, and 0.3 kW for 1–30 min. In total, ohmic baking only needed a few minutes to obtain a fully expanded GF bread. The determination of pasting properties and starch digestibility demonstrated that these breads were comparable or even superior to GF breads baked in a conventional baking oven.