Use of Modified Atmosphere Packaging to Manage Quality of Green Garlic Leaves during Cold Storage Period

Green garlic leaves are consumed as fresh and cooked in Turkey and in some part of the world such as Asia, America and Africa. This crop could be considered as a promising export product in Turkey’s exportation volume. For this reason, we investigated how different package materials such as low-density polyethylene (LDPE) and closed polypropylene transparent boxes (CPTB) maintain some quality parameters of green garlic (Allim sativum L.) leaves. For that purpose, garlic leaves were stored at 10 °C and 80±5% relative humidity for 12 days after cutting, pre-cooling and packaging. Weight loss (WL), soluble solids content (SSC), titratable acidity (TA), chlorophyll content as SPAD reading, visual quality (VQ), color, total phenolic content (TPC) and total antioxidant capacity (TAC) were measured at 3, 6, 9 and 12 days during storage period. Our results indicated that both packaging materials significantly maintained (P ≤ 0.05) WL, TA, chlorophyll content, VQ and TPC compared to controls (unpacked samples). Pearson Correlation tests showed that WL, color (L*, b*), TA and TAC could be used as marker to determine storage life of green garlic leaves. In addition, CPTB package is more effective in maintaining quality of green garlic leaves during cold storage.