Drying of chillies
Practical Action
Drying during the wet season
During the wet season or times of high humidity, which often coincides with the harvest of the
spices, a solar dryer or sun drying cannot be used effectively. An artificial dryer which uses a
cheap energy source is necessary. This may be a wood or husk burning dryer or a combined
wood burning and solar dryer. The technical brief on drying of foods contains more information
on artificial dryers.
Over drying
Care needs to be taken to prevent over drying of the chillies. A dryer operator will soon learn how
to assess the moisture content of the chillies by hand. The final moisture content should be
10% wet basis.
Grading
In some cases the dried chillies need to be graded, eg to gain a premium price for high quality
packaged products. Chillies are graded by colour and size – the brighter the colour red the
better. Grading is carried out by hand.
Grinding
Dried chillies can either be sold whole or ground into a powder. Grinding is one way of adding
value to the product, but it must be done carefully to avoid problems and losses of material. A
whole, intact product can be easily assessed for quality whereas a ground product is more
difficult. Some consumers do not like to buy ground spices for fear that they have been
adulterated. This fear can be overcome by producing a consistently high quality product and
gaining the confidence of customers. Ground spices also lose their flavour and pungency much
more quickly than whole spices. Therefore, grinding the chillies reduces their shelf life and
potentially means that you may suffer from higher losses as you will have to discard any ground
spice that does not sell. It is essential that the ground powder is well packaged in moisture proof
bags to prevent it taking up moisture. You really should only grind spices if you have an assured
market with a rapid turnover for the product. Basically there are two types of grinder - manual
and mechanical. Whichever type you opt for, it must be placed in a separate and well-ventilated
room because of the dust that it creates.
Manual grinding mills
There are many manual grinders that could be used to grind chilli (see equipment suppliers
below).
An experienced operator can grind about 20kg in an eight hour day. However, this is hard and
boring work. A treadle or bicycle could easily be attached to the grinder which will make the
work easier. With this system one person could grind about 30kg in one day.
Consumer research should be carried out to find out the fineness of grinding that the consumer
wants. The grinding mills then need to be set so that they produce the desired ground product.
For small-scale production, (up to 100kg/day) a series of these grinders is all that is needed. For
larger scale production units, a mechanical grinder would be required.
Mechanical grinding mills
There are a range of mills - horizontal plate, vertical plate or hammer mills - that are suitable for
grinding chillies. The choice of mill depends on what is available in your particular area and the
price of the mill.
Packaging
Packaging material
Packaging of these products, especially if they are ground requires polypropylene. Polythene
cannot be used as the flavour components diffuse through it.
3