Pungency: The Stimuli and Their Evaluation

Abstract

The quality that distinguishes an appetising meal, which one wants to eat, from a collection of cooked components that satisfy merely one's nutritional requirements, is flavor. Aroma, and the traditionally accepted four tastes, sweet, sour, salt, and bitter, are part of most foods and they are further developed or altered during cooking. Even so, most cooked foods are still considered insipid, and require food additives, such as spices, herbs and pot entiators, to boost the flavour. The important contributions of spices and herbs to sensory qualities, other than aroma, are the new dimensions, pungency and astrigency. Apart from imparting a specific altered aroma, they increase the pre-and post-ingestion al cues which are important in increasing awareness and appreci ation of the food, and thereby lead to increased ingestion (1). Thus, the notion of food flavour -which is commonly understood as aroma and taste -should be expanded to cover the contribution of pungency.Pungency, an appraisal of the term

Pungent Qualities of Sanshool-Related Compounds Evaluated by a Sensory Test and Activation of Rat TRPV1

“…The four sanshool samples ( to ) had SU values similar to piperine from pepper (1:0 Â 10 5 SU) and 6-gingerol from ginger (8:0 Â 10 4 SU). The SU value for capsaicin (1:6 Â 10 7 SU) 8) was 200 times higher than the values for these sanshools. Cliff et al 19) have reported that the effect of piperine, capsaicin, and ginger oleoresin, whose concentrations were about 20 fold higher than their threshold values, except for ginger oleoresin, was predominantly one of burning, with slight tingling and numbing sensations.…”

“…This dilution series was monitored by the method described by Sizer et al 17) In respect of capsaicin, the largest number of panelists evaluated the threshold value as 9:0 Â 10 À8 g/ml. Although the reported detection threshold for capsaicin is 6:3 Â 10 À8 g/ml (1:6 Â 10 7 SU), 8) the result that the largest number of panelists in this study evaluated the threshold value as 9:0 Â 10 À8 g/ml is appropriate considering the dilution series of the capsaicin solution. An 8-step binary dilution series of each sanshool sample solution from 20 Â 10 À5 g/ml (step 1) to 0:156 Â 10 À5 g/ml (step 8) was prepared and presented to the panelists starting from step 1 for hydroxy -and -sanshool, from step 2 for -and -sanshool, and from step 3 for -and -sanshool.…”

“…They have reported that hydroxyand hydroxy -sanshools, having one cis and three or four trans double bonds in the molecule, are strongly pungent, while hydroxy -sanshool, having all-trans double bonds, is tasteless. 6) A number of reports have been published on the taste and detection threshold of the pungent principles from such other plant species as hot pepper, pepper, ginger, galangal, and myoga, [8][9][10] but little is known about the characteristics of the taste of sanshools, because authentic samples are available only by isolating natural sanshool from plants or by synthesis of it.…”

Putting out the fire: Effects of tastants on oral chemical irritation

“…This was confirmed by a statistically better fit of exponential decay, as opposed to linear, in 15 of 18 curves (median r" = .986, fit to group means). Discussion Govindarajan (1979), in a comprehensive review of irritant compounds, suggested that all pungencies (his term for oral irritants) are qualitatively the same. Although this mayor may not be true in terms of perceived quality of bum, a growing number of observations indicate important sensory differences among oral irritants.…”

Palladium Complex Containing Curcumin as Ligand: Thermal and Spectral Characterization

“…Curcumin, a component of Curcuma Longa rhizomes is a phenolic compound that has a series of beneficial properties such as antitumor activity, anti-inflammatory and antioxidant [1][2][3][4][5]. This series of beneficial properties has caused an explosive growth in the interest of the academic community to understand how this compound acts, for example, in preventing cancer.…”