Fruit and Vegetable Quality

Juiciness was significantly reduced by the treatments; perhaps the per-
ception of the sugars is reduced in presence of low juiciness. The ratio
reducing sugars to titratable acids was almost unchanged throughout the
experiments and could therefore not be identified as contributing to sweet
note or a consumer acceptance.
The combination of an instrumental method to estimate a juicy mouth-
feel and the sugar concentration could work as a predictor for the sweet
note of tomatoes, which contributes considerably to consumer accep-
tance. The sweet taste proved to have (within the analyzed range) a pos-
itive effect on consumer acceptance, which other contributors can
counteract, like off-flavors or adverse texture properties as in the case
of firmness.

Fruit and Peel Firmness

Closely related to the consumer dislike rating “too firm” and “peel
disturbs” were the instrumental data for the pressure firmness and punc-
ture force. This can be seen in Figure 10.1 and more clearly in Figure
10.2. In Experiment 2 the range of the instrumental values was much
higher, counteracting acceptability (Table 10.5).
The recommendability of tomatoes was reduced when high puncture

Fruit and Peel Firmness 191

FIGURE 10.3Acceptance vs. descriptive note sweet: recommendable36.031.09

• sweet note, R0.73.