nofima.no
Creating value
2013
35
Financed by:
Foundation for Research
Levy on Agricultural
Products
Kristine Myhrer and Morten T. Paulsen prepare beer samples for a test to see if choice of beer influences the liking of soups.
photo: Jon-Are Berg-Jacobsen © nofima
Food producers measure the consumers’ liking of their
products by testing these individually. The products may
be experienced differently in combination with other
products in a meal. It may also be difficult to measure
flavour sensations in several products simultaneously,
and how flavour can change over time.
“Increased knowledge about sensory interactions
in meals may help the industry to develop new and
healthier food and drink combinations with improved
sensory properties. What is most important in such stud-
ies is of course to find out what people like to eat,” says
PhD candidate Morten T. Paulsen.
First he studied how the flavour of salmon is affected
by varying the basic tastes in sauces accompanying it.
The flavour changed with different basic tastes. The
combination with salt, for example, showed that the
flavour of fish and fish oil in salmon was significantly
reduced.
The interaction between salmon and sauce was also
investigated in a dynamic method, where one describes
how the flavour develops while one chews the food and
the aftertaste after spitting it out.
“The timing for when specific properties dominated
had a great effect. If a sour taste was perceived early
in the chewing stage, the consumer was of the opinion
that this was positive. If the sour taste emerged late
in the chewing stage, it was perceived as negative,”
Paulsen says.
Paulsen also investigated dynamic perception be-
tween samples with minor sensory differences, which
is relevant in the case of recipe changes to e.g. low-salt
products. The results indicated differences between the
samples, which are not detected by conventional sen-
sory profiling.
Sensory interactions between two different types of
beer and and soups differing in the basic tastes were
also investigated.
The results showed no clear interaction in relation to
the various basic tastes, but the beer types influenced
consumer acceptance of the samples.
A doctoral thesis demonstrates the importance of understanding the
effect of different flavours in food when they are combined in a meal.
Taste interaction in meals
