EFFECT OF LOW TEMPERATURE STORAGE FOR UNCOOKED SALA LAUAK

Sala lauak is known as a traditional snack from Pariaman, West Sumatera made from rice, dried fish and spices. It is sold in different ways which are ready-to-eat snack, uncooked sala and sala lauak flour. Nowadays, consumers prefer uncooked sala since they can cook at home and can be consumed fresher and healthier. However, the shelf life of uncooked sala is very short which limit product distribution and selling area. Based on survey of sellers, quality of uncooked sala only maintain for 12 hours. Further, there is still inadequate study on uncooked sala lauak and its change during storage. This study is observing quality change on uncooked sala that stored in the refrigerator condition (10?C) at room temperature (26-30?C). Uncooked sala was sealed in PP plastic for 6 days of studies. The quality component is related to the proximate components, hardness, color (?Hue and Chroma), and total plate count (TPC). Initially, uncooked sala has 68.01 % of water content, 1.38% of ash, 1.91% of protein, 0.047% fat, 28.67% of carbohydrate (by difference), hardness 168.5 gram force, and 79.12?Hue, 29.55 Chroma. Based on total plate count, too numerous to count (TNTC) were found on uncooked sala stored after 3 days while those at room temperature was already TNTC after the first day. It was observed that ash, protein content, fat, and hardness significantly different between uncooked sala stored in room temperature and to those in refrigerator while water content and color changing almost similar between those storage conditions.