Sensory Characteristics and Consumer Acceptability of Decaffeinated Green Teas

• Published in: Journal of food science 2009-04, Vol.74 (3), p.S135-S141
• Main Authors: Lee, S.M, Lee, H.-S, Kim, K.-H, Kim, K.-O
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Biological and medical sciences; Caffeine; Caffeine - analysis; Caffeine - isolation & purification; canned foods; Carbon Dioxide; Chromatography, Supercritical Fluid; Coffee, tea and other stimulative beverage industries; consumer acceptability; consumer acceptance; Consumer Behavior; decaffeination; descriptive analysis; Extraction processes; Female; flavor; food composition; Food Handling - methods; Food industries; food processing; food processing quality; Food science; Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; green tea; Humans; Methods; Odorants - analysis; PLSR; SC-CO2 decaffeinated green tea; Sensation; sensory characteristics; sensory properties; supercritical fluid extraction; Taste; Tea; tea (beverage); Tea - chemistry; temperature
• ISSN: 0022-1147; 1750-3841
• DOI: 10.1111/j.1750-3841.2009.01100.x

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-CO₂) 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-CO₂ method and to observe the relationship with consumer acceptability to elucidate the potentiality of applying SC-CO₂ 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-CO₂ 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-CO₂ 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.