Microencapsulation of lemon oil by spray drying and its applicationin flavour tea

The aim of this research paper is to develop cost effective coating material for encapsulating lemon oil (as a flavour) without compromising encapsulating efficiency. The three coating materials, namely gum arabic (GA), maltodextrin (MD) and modified starch (MS) and their binary and ternary blends were used to encapsulate lemon oil using spray drying technique. Their properties such as viscosity, emulsion stability, surface oil, total oil, encapsulation efficiency, entrapment efficiency, bulk density and particle size have been investigated. The blend of GA: MS in ratio of 50:50 gave highest encapsulation efficiency. As the percentage of maltodextrin in coating material was increased, the properties of encapsulated material were affected. The encapsulated lemon oil showed better results in instant ice tea premix for beverage with a stability of 6 months.