Encapsulation is a current, important and broadly used process to retain and protect volatile and flavoring compounds in commercial food products. Unfortunately, production of these materials is largely an empirical science. In the present investigation, gum Arabic was used as carrier and orange peel oil was chosen as a core ingredient because, besides having a great economic importance in food industry, its volatile components are highly sensitive to oxidation by effect of temperature, light and oxygen presence. Although several encapsulation methods have been reported, the spray drying technology has become one of the most important processes used to produce dry flavors from liquids throughout the food and beverage. Orange peel oil was encapsulated with gum Arabic via spray drying using inlet and exit air temperatures of 200 C and 100 C, resp. The resultant powders were analyzed for moisture content, surface content and total oil. The high retention % of orange peel oil powder (89%) could be successfully prepared in the gum Arabic materials with low surface content comparing with 20% w/w of the conventional methods. As regard to the safety of encapsulated orange oil, it was noticed that glucose serum, cholesterol and aminotransferases enzymes exhibited no significant changes as compared to control. Meanwhile, creatinine content (mg/dl)was significantly increased from 0.8 (in control) to 1.06 mg/dl, after encapsulated orange oil treatment.
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