Nutmeg essential oil with volatile components is sensitive to oxygen, light, water and high temperature. Spray-drying is widely used as an encapsulation technique for improving compound stability during processing and storage. In this study, influence of encapsulated matrix on spray-dried nutmeg essential oil microcapsule was investigated using blends of maltodextrin and either gum Arabic(GA-MD), or octenyl succinic acid modified starch(OSA-MD) as wall materials. Characteristics of spray-dried powders from these 2 wall materials were evaluated and compared. Powder property analysis indicated that GA-MD microcapsules presented larger size, higher moisture and poorer flowability compared with OSA-MD microcapsules. Fourier transforms infrared spectroscopy and thermogravimetric analysis showed that both GA-MD and OSA-MD microcapsules improved the stability of nutmeg essential oil. However, GA-MD microcapsules exhibited higher storage stability than OSA-MD microcapsules. This research provided theoretical foundation for wall material choice of microcapsule and nutmeg essential oil utilization in food industry.
