A b s t r a c t. The aim of the study was to determine the effect of different drying methods on selected physical properties of pomace obtained from purple carrot cv. Deep Purple. Drying was performed using four methods: convective, microwave-convective, infrared-convective and freeze-drying. The freeze-dried material had the lowest apparent density (422 kg m -3 ), which was caused by slight shrinkage, and indicated high porosity. Apparent density was almost three times greater in dried materials produced using the other drying methods as compared to the freeze-dried variants. Freeze-dried pomace adsorbed vapour more quickly than the other dried variants, which was caused by its high porosity and relatively low degree of structural damage. Rehydration characteristics were significantly affected by the drying method. The highest mass increase and losses of soluble substance were recorded for the freeze-dried samples. Conversely, the traditional convective drying method resulted in the lowest mass increase and soluble substance leaching. A positive linear correlation was found between the loss of soluble dry substance components and the absorbance of liquid obtained during rehydration.K e y w o r d s: purple carrot, drying, rehydration, hygroscopic properties INTRODUCTION Purple carrot roots contain considerable amounts of prohealth compounds. Similarly as in the traditional orange carrot, purple carrot contains carotenoids and phenolic acids as well as acylated anthocyanin pigments -the latter are in contrast to the traditional cultivars . These pigments are relatively stable to heat and pH change as compared to the non-acylated anthocyanins found in berry fruits, such as currants, bilberries or strawberries.Many different drying methods are used to remove moisture from food of plant origin. The applied method should provide a dried product of the highest possible quality, ie one characterized by only slight structure change, appropriate composition, high nutritive value and good sensory attributes. To produce such a dried product it is necessary to choose the best drying method and to select the optimal drying conditions (Marabi et al., 2006;Perera, 2005;Ratti, 2001). Deterioration of quality takes place due to high temperature, internal mass flow as well as water loss and shrinkage. Changes also take place due to the influence of the drying process on the physical properties of the dried material, such as apparent density, rehydration and hygroscopic properties (Stêpieñ, 2008).Convective drying is the most frequently applied method. The low energy efficiency of this method and the relatively poor quality of the dried product (Wang and Chao, 2002) have led researchers to seek other methods that would provide a high-quality product in terms of quality and low production costs. Combined infrared convective drying is one such method. Infrared drying shortens the drying time by as much as 50% in comparison with convective drying at similar material temperatures (Nowak and Lewicki, 2004). The quality of microwave-co...