Descriptive Profiling

Descriptive Profiling

Summary:

Descriptive words are very important when it comes to sensory analysis as they can give an idea of how a product tastes and/or feels, for example if a product is described as being creamy the texture and taste should have the mouth feel and flavour associated with cream.

The objective of this exercise was to construct a comparative test questionnaire consisting of a number of questions the group thought were relevant to the food. The group decided to base the questions on the following attributes of the bread:

• Appearance

• Odour

• Texture

• Flavour

• Mouth feel

• Overall Acceptability

The second part of the objective was to select and train potential panellists to test the products and complete the questionnaire.

The results showed some interesting outcomes. The tesco own brand bread being the most surprising of the lot by scoring considerably higher than the Brennans and Johnston, Mooney and O’Brian’s bread in numerous questions. These results were interesting, as the tesco own brand bread would be considered to be a low quality cheap alternative.

Methods and Materials:

The class was divided into four groups. The groups tasted samples of the products, which they were going to create a questionnaire on. This was to help them when deciding on the key attributes for the questionnaire.

The group compiled six questions based on the following attributes that were deemed to be the best to describe the crumb and crust of the bread.

• Appearance

• Odour

• Texture

• Flavour

• Mouth feel

• Overall Acceptability

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