Emerging research approaches benefit to the study of cooked cured ham flavour

The analysis of the aroma of a food product requires the extraction of its volatile compounds. As the composition of the extract obtained depends on the extraction method, it is important to verify that the odour actually extracted is representative of the product. This verification is particularly relevant in the case of cooked cured ham, as its odour is not very strong as compared to other cured products (dry cured ham or sausage). Extracts were obtained by four different vacuum distillation processes. A sensory comparison of the odour of these extracts with the reference product was performed by ten trained panelists. The odour similarity of the extracts with the reference was assessed in order to select the most representative one, upon defined descriptors. Direct vacuum distillation of ground ham suspended in water was selected as the most representative. Gas chromatography (GC)-olfactometry, a technique of choice to identify potent odorants in food products, was then planned. As one of the key point of this analysis is to correlate the Flame Ionization Detector (FID) detection to the sniffing one, a problem very often underestimated by authors, a GC-olfactometric study of a model mixture was first performed with three selected people. FID and sniffing detection of this model mixture were compared in terms of retention time reproducibility. Standard deviation of retention indices observed for sniffing and FID detection were found in the same range. Retention indices calculated with both detections differed within a confidence interval of ± 3 index values. FID and odour detection were found to be correlated within this interval.