Fried snacks emerged as one of the enticing, delightful snacks of modern consumers. Vacuum frying emerged as a new frying technology that improves the quality and retains the nutrients of food products. The concept of applying this to marine produce, specifically the “aninikad” could be a unique product since mostly vacuum frying is applied to fruits and vegetables. This study aims to utilize, optimize and evaluate the sensory acceptability of the vacuum fried aninikad. Response Surface Methodology using Central Composite Design (CCD) of Experiment was employed in order to optimize the product. The three identified factors, namely pre-cooking time (5, 10, and 15 min.), soy sauce (5, 10, and 15 %) and sugar (20, 30 and 40%), were used in the experiment. Determination of the sensory acceptability was the parameter used for optimization. The optimum condition of the product that would give acceptability of ≥7.1 was 9.7 min. pre-cooking time, 9% soy sauce level and 30.2% sugar level. Hence, the results in this study prove that a healthy snack can be produced and will add value to aninikad.
