Among temperate fruits cultivated in Brazil, the production of apple increased the most in the last years. It is mainly addressed to the consumption in natura, but juice is becoming an important by-product. For this reason, it is an alternative to utilize rejected fruits to make juice. With the objective to reach this goal, the composition of Gala, Golden Delicious, and Fuji juices was studied. This experiment was conducted from 1995 to 1997, analyzing apple juices from commercial orchards of Fraiburgo and São Joaquim, in the State of Santa Catarina, and Vacaria and Caxias do Sul, in the State of Rio Grande do Sul. Besides the juice analysis, performed by physicochemical methods, mineral composition was determined by atomic absorption. Data were submitted to principal component analysis (PCA) where the three first axes explained 81.3% of the total variation. The PCA permitted to separate the juices according to cultivars. The variables presenting the highest effect in apple juice differentiation were total soluble solids (ºBrix), density (DEN), reducing sugars (AR), ºBrix/Total acidity (ACT) ratio, malic acid (ACM), and the minerals Mg, Cu, Zn, Rb, P and K. Regarding the geographical origin, juices from São Joaquim - SC and Vacaria - RS showed more similarities in their composition, mainly due to Fuji and Golden Delicious cultivars.
processing; apple juice; chemical composition
