Scoring system for organoleptic evaluation of honey-cedar syrup development

Organoleptic analysis provides an understanding and assessment of human perception of food product characteristics, while there is a limited number of studies aimed at creating organoleptic methods for assessing the quality of processed natural honey and Siberian pine seeds. The objectives of the work are to create a dictionary of organoleptic indicators of honey-cedar syrups and to develop a scoring system for organoleptic assessment of honey-cedar syrups. Objects of research: Siberian pine seed kernels and semi-finished products from them, natural flower honey, and experimental samples of honey-cedar syrups. The authors used standard organoleptic and statistical methods to achieve the goals. As a result of the research, the initial list of descriptive characteristics of honey-cedar syrups was reduced from 127 to 13 descriptors – appearance and texture (viscosity, homogeneity), color (brown, uniform), aroma (honey, nutty), taste and aftertaste (sweet, rich, honey, nutty, floral, tart, long aftertaste). A five-point system of organoleptic assessment of products has been developed taking into account the developed dictionary, in which the weight coefficient of the indicator (appearance and texture, color, aroma, taste and aftertaste - respectively 0.25; 0.15; 0.20 and 0.40) is multiplied by a point (if non-conformity is established – by the lowest). The points obtained for each indicator are summed up and the quality level is determined: excellent – above 4.4 points; good – 3.7–4.4 points; satisfactory – 2.9–3.69 points; unsatisfactory – below 2.9 points. As a result of the validation of the scoring system, the experimental samples of honey-cedar syrups with different ratios of natural honey and semi-finished product from cedar pine seed kernels were ranked by quality levels as follows: excellent– sample 60:40 (4.68 points) > sample 55:45 (4.6 points) > sample 65:35 (4.48 points); good – sample 70:30 (4.32 points). The scoring system for organoleptic evaluation of honey-cedar syrup is a means of communication between stakeholders at various stages of the product life cycle.