Performance of different drying methods and their effects on the chemical quality attributes of raw cocoa material

Studies were carried out to investigate the impact of different drying processes on the chemical quality traits of raw cocoa beans. The pH of less fermented cocoa is higher than the well-fermented cocoa's. The sun-dried beans pH ranged from 4.5 to 5.5, while the pH of both oven- and mixed-dried beans was between 3.8 and 5.2. The sun-dried beans contained lower volatile acidity than oven-dried beans. Artificially dried beans resulted in higher free acidity content when compared to both sun- and mixed-dried beans. Ammonium nitrogen content in raw cocoa beans is not influenced by the drying methods. Free fatty acid content increases slowly but remains below the critical value of 1.75% whatever the drying processes. While oven-dried beans show the FFA content above 0.70% both of sun- and mixed-dried beans are associated with FFA content below 0.70%.