A novel strategy for producing low-sugar pomegranate jam with better anthocyanin stability: Combination of high-pressure processing and low methoxyl & amidated pectin

Low-sugar jams (LSJ) are promoted as a healthier food option due to the healthy trend, and significant color changes negatively affects the evaluation of these products. To reveal protective effect of low methoxyl & amidated pectin (LMA) on anthocyanin in jam treated by high-pressure processing (HPP), this study compared the changes in microbes and quality attributes of LSJ prepared with LMA and high-sugar pomegranate jam (HSJ) prepared with high methoxyl pectin (HMP) after HPP at 600 MPa for 5 min during accelerated storage at 35 °C for 30 days, and molecular dynamics simulation was conducted to reveal the interaction between LMA and anthocyanin. LSJ-HPP had better color quality with higher values of L*, a*, and total anthocyanin content (TAC), the corresponding percent polymeric color and browning index were 41% and 16% lower than those of HSJ-HPP, respectively. TAC in LSJ-HPP, HSJ, and HSJ-HPP decreased to 9.5, 8.6, and 6.0 mg/kg (pomegranate puree) after storage, respectively. Cyanidin-3-O-glucoside formed more H-bonds with LMA than HMP, while their total interaction energy and the binding frequency and number were also higher. This study provided a foundation for the processing and storage of high quality LSJ, and also broadened the application field of HPP technology.