The effect of salt replacers and flavor enhancer on the processing characteristics and consumer acceptance of turkey sausages.

Background: Producing high-quality processed meats that contain reduced amounts of sodium chloride is a major challenge facing industry owing to the importance of sodium chloride toward the functional, microbial stability and sensory properties of these products. In order to create reduced sodium alternatives, a number of commercial salt replacers and flavor enhancers have entered the market; however, their ability to be applied in processed meats requires investigation. In this study, two salt replacers (Ocean's Flavor - OF45, OF60) and one flavor enhancer (Fonterra™ Savoury Powder - SP) were evaluated for their ability to effectively reduce sodium while maintaining the functional and sensory properties of turkey sausages.

Modifying bitterness in functional food systems.

The functional foods sector represents a significant and growing portion of the food industry, yet formulation of these products often involves the use of ingredients that elicit less than desirable oral sensations, including bitterness. Promising new functional ingredients, including polyphenolics, may be more widely and readily employed in the creation of novel functional foods if their aversive bitter taste can be significantly reduced. A number of approaches are used by the industry to improve the taste properties and thus the acceptance of conventional foods that elicit excessive bitterness.

Optimizing the orosensory properties of model functional beverages: the influence of novel sweeteners, odorants, bitter blockers, and their mixtures on (+)-catechin.

Unlabelled: The use of flavor-modifying strategies are important to improving the sensory profile of some excessively bitter and astringent functional ingredients, such as (+)-catechin (CAT). Two bitter blockers (ß-cyclodextrin [CYCLO], homoeriodictyol sodium salt [HED]), two sweeteners (sucrose [SUC], rebaudioside A [REB]), and two odorants (vanillin [VAN], black tea aroma [TEA]) were assessed for their efficacy at modifying the bitterness and astringency of CAT in model aqueous solutions. The intensity of oral sensations elicited by CAT was determined in duplicate in binary, ternary, and quaternary mixtures of these stimuli by a trained panel (n = 15) using a 15 cm visual analogue scale.