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Sensory Characteristics and Consumer Acceptability of Decaffeinated Green Teas
Author(s) -
Lee S.M.,
Lee H.S.,
Kim K.H.,
Kim K.O.
Publication year - 2009
Publication title -
journal of food science
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.772
H-Index - 150
eISSN - 1750-3841
pISSN - 0022-1147
DOI - 10.1111/j.1750-3841.2009.01100.x
Subject(s) - green tea , caffeine , food science , green coffee , chemistry , green tea extract , health benefits , psychology , traditional medicine , medicine , psychiatry
Green tea has been widely consumed for its mild flavors and its health benefits, yet caffeine in green tea has been a limitation for those who want to avoid it. The limitation brought increase in need for decaffeinated products in the green tea market. Most of the conventional decaffeination techniques applied in food use organic solvents. However, supercritical carbon dioxide fluid extraction (SC‐CO 2 ) method is gaining its intension as one of the future decaffeination methods that overcomes the problems of conventional methods. The purpose of this study was to identify sensory characteristics of decaffeinated green teas applied with SC‐CO 2 method and to observe the relationship with consumer acceptability to elucidate the potentiality of applying SC‐CO 2 technique in decaffeinated green tea market. Descriptive analysis was performed on 8 samples: green teas containing 4 caffeine levels (10%, 35%, 60%, and 100%) infused at 2 infusing periods (1 or 2 min). It was found that the SC‐CO 2 process not only reduced caffeine but also decreased some important features of original tea flavors. Two groups were recruited for consumer acceptability test: one (GP I, N = 52), consuming all types of green teas including hot/cold canned teas; and the other (GP II, N = 40), only consuming the loose type. While GP II liked original green tea the most, GP I liked highly decaffeinated green teas. Although the SC‐CO 2 method had limitations of losing complex flavors of green teas, it appeared to have future potential in the decaffeinated green tea market within or without the addition of desirable flavors.