CoSSOL ProjectModule 3

Third meeting in FrancePérigueux

11th to 15th May 2011

Organoleptic Analysis: Practical Exercise

The test is based on two organoleptic exercises:1) one on strawberries;2) another on Duck «foie gras» (fat liver )

o The use of mathematical probability laws will enable us to

keep only one hypothesis.

Objectives

The organoleptic tests involved 30 partners of the COSSOL project from 11 European countries.

This number of participants is enough to assess that 14 identical answers suffice to decide whether the test is successful or not with a small 5% error margin.

Methodology

Test 1 : Tasting of strawberrieso The triangular test with the binominal law

enables us to know if the public can distinguish two different varieties of strawberries.

Test 2 : Tasting of «foie gras»o The Wilcoxon test method enables us to

hiérarchise the taste of two regional products from the same category: «whole half-cooked foie gras» on the one hand, «portion of duck Foie Gras with chunks of liver» on the other.

Experiments

Test 1: The triangular test enabled the public to actually distinguish the two different varieties of strawberries.

Test 2: The Wilconxon test method enabled the public to hiérarchise the two different foie gras products according to their taste.

o The «portion of duck Foie Gras with chunks of liver» was clearly preferred to the «whole half-cooked foie gras »

Results

Step 1 : The teacher provides tyhe class with the basic elements that need to be known.

Step 2 : The organoleptic analysis enables us to:o put the notions evoked previously into

practice.o Ease their assimilation by the

students;o Understand tyhe meaning and the

utility of these elements;o Make a link between theory and

practice.

Carrying out the tests with a class