Sensory characterization of the perceived quality of East African highland cooking bananas (matooke)

Abstract

BACKGROUNDIt has recently become increasingly evident that banana projects in Uganda need to consider consumer preferences as part of the breeding process to increase the acceptability of new cultivars. A trained panel used quantitative descriptive analysis (QDA) as a tool to assess the sensory characteristics of 32 cooking bananas (matooke). The aim was to investigate which sensory characteristics best describe matooke.RESULTSFourteen descriptors were generated. The preferred attributes of matooke were high‐intensity yellow color, homogeneous distribution of yellow color, good matooke aroma, highly moldable by touch, moist and smooth in the mouth. Analysis of variance revealed significant differences in the yellowness, homogeneity of color, firmness, moistness, smoothness, matooke aroma, hardness, and moldability across the genotypes (P < 0.05). Principal component analysis (PCA) showed strong positive correlations between yellowness and homogeneity of the color (R = 0.92). Smoothness in the mouth and moldability by touch were strongly and positively correlated (R = 0.88). Firmness in the mouth was well predicted by hardness to touch (R2 = 0.85). The matooke samples were ranked into two sensory clusters by agglomerative hierarchical clustering (AHC).CONCLUSIONThe study showed attribute terms that could be used to describe matooke and also revealed that QDA may be used as a tool during the assessment and selection of new cooking banana hybrids to identify relevant sensory attributes because of its ability to discriminate among the banana hybrids. © 2023 The Authors. Journal of The Science of Food and Agriculture published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of Society of Chemical Industry.

East African highland cooking banana: towards an efficient selection of hybrids with user‐preferred food quality traits

“…The colour of all the landrace genotypes were scored 7.4 and above, suggesting that the preference for intensity of yellowness in the matooke was high (towards a maximum of 10). 17 These descriptive scores coincided with genotypes with highly acceptable quality characteristics. 4,18 Landraces Kibuzi, Mbwazirume, Nakitembe and Mpologoma, all of them highly liked by users, were < 3.0, suggesting that users favor a soft texture (Table 2).…”

“…Previous studies identified the user-preferred physical and sensory quality characteristics of EAHCB and their descriptors. 4,17,18 In the present study, the bunch, finger, colour and textural qualitative user-preferred characteristics were translated into quantitative metric measurements to aid high-throughput screening of a large number of genotypes.…”

“…Finger curvature was estimated by the ratio of the inner to outer curve of the fingers. 19 The textural, colour and astringency taste attributes were determined by cooking as described by Nowakunda et al 12 The cooked samples were subjected to a 12-member descriptive sensory panel using a 10-point intensity scale for each attribute as described in the matooke lexicon by Khakasa et al 17 The published matooke sensory lexicon was used in the sensory assessment of quality traits. 12 The acceptability of the same genotypes was evaluated by a 30-member panel of matooke consumers using a nine-point hedonic scale.…”

“…15 It is therefore imperative to translate the qualitative descriptions of preferred characteristics into objective instrumental and biochemical indicators that are deployable sufficiently early in the breeding process. 16 The present study aimed to build on previous research 4,17,18 that identified user preferred quality characteristics by quantifying selected qualitative indicators of the user-preferred qualities of EAHCB into quantitative metrics to enable their utilization in early and efficient selection of hybrids tailored to user needs.…”

Analysis of association of sensory and laboratory assessments for quality and consumer acceptability of steamed East Africa highland bananas

“…Principal component analysis (PCA) linking qualitative and quantitative data PCA was used to determine the mean values of different characteristics and describe their relationships with the matooke samples. 40 PCA was used to summarize the relationships between CATA sensory characteristics, product samples and mean overall liking of each product scored by all the consumers, as well as for linking qualitative and quantitative data.…”