The power of potato is known for sustaining millions of lives by providing food and nutrition during distress times. Its high production potential per unit area, high nutritional value and great taste makes potato one of the most important food crops in the world. Classified as a vegetable, potatoes help contribute to the minimum goal of eating five servings of fruits and vegetables per day. Dehydrated potato flakes are made by pressing cooked mashed potatoes onto a drum drier, which forms a sheet that can be broken up and ground to the required density. Potato flakes can be used anywhere, where one would use mashed potatoes.
Potato flakes have kept the original flavor of potatoes as much as possible. 70%-80% of lasting leisure small foods and approximately 30% of convenient foods are potato products, this shows that consumers prefer for the potato flavor. Only by aging some water, the potato flakes can be returned to the water potato mash which are comparable with the fresh potato mash whether it’s outward appearance or taste.
At present, good quality flakes at affordable prices are not available in the country. Therefore, only the manufacturers of premium products have been in a position to use this product. Further, as flakes are generally imported in container loads, only bulk users can afford keep stocks and the agents importing the products have never tried to reach to the small end users. The consumption of potato flakes in India can increase manifold, once a good quality product, at an economical price is available.
The potato flakes are also used as a replacement for various flour such corn flour, wheat flour etc. In a country such as India, potato flakes are used for various Indian delicacies like aloobonda, fillings for samosa, dosa, aloobhujia, alooparatha, etc. Potato flakes are the most important form of dehydrated potato products, which also include potato granules, pellets, powder, shredded and sliced potato. Dehydrated potato flakes are made by pressing cooked mashed potatoes onto a drum drier, which forms a sheet that can be broken up and ground to the required density.
Few Indian major players are as under:
· Asha Ram & Sons Pvt. Ltd.
· Aurofood Pvt. Ltd.
· Balaji Wafers Pvt. Ltd.
· Basukinath Food Processors Ltd.
· Indian Food Fermentations Ltd.
· Iscon Balaji Foods Pvt. Ltd.