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A simple, efficient, external inlet assembly is described for analyzing volatile components in raw and processed foods by direct gas chromatography and mass spectrometry. The device comprises three sections: a sample inlet, a condenser, and a six-port rotary valve. The versatility and effectiveness of this assembly is demonstrated by the analysis and identification of volatiles from diverse food products as salad oils, vinegar, and corn-soy food blends. The procedure is rapid, efficient, and offers the foUowing desirable features: it is compatible with all commonly used chromatographs and can accomodate samples of different size; sample volatiles are obtained without use of prior enrichment techniques, at ambient or elevated temperatures; uniform heating enhances volatiles elution, thereby improving sensitivity; moisture and air are removed to facilitate mass spectral analysis; the closed nature of the system minimizes loss of low molecular weight volatiles during elution, thus producing a highly reliable profile of volatiles.

Raw, freshly cooked, stored and recooked beef muscle samples were assessed by chemical, instrumental and sensory methods of analyses for flavor quality, with particular emphasis on warmed-over flavor (WOF). The character notes used by a trained sensory panel to describe WOF were cardboardy, rancid, stale, and metallic. Samples analyzed by direct gas chromatography utilizing either packed or fused silica capillary columns showed that compounds usually associated with lipid oxidation reactions could be used as marker compounds to follow the development of WOF. Of the many compounds that appeared to be markers, hexanal and 2,3-octanedione as well as total volatiles showed a highly significant degree of correlation when compared to sensory scores and 2-thiobar bituric acid (TBA) numbers. Many of the volatile compounds that were identified in WOF meat samples were also found in the distillates prepared for the TBA reaction.

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