Analysis of sensory and texture properties of three potato cultivars boiled to different thermal center temperatures

Abstract: Potatoes Solanum tuberosum, L are among the most consumed crop type by millions of people around the world. It has high amount of starch content and it is known to be a good source of potassium, vitamin B6, vitamin C and fiber. There are more than 4000 varieties of potatoes. Salome, Ditta and Asterix cultivars are among well-known potatoes in the Swedish market. In recent years the consumption of potatoes is shifting from fresh potatoes to processed potatoes. The texture of potatoes is one of the important quality parameter in consumer’s choice. Sensory quality of a potato combined with Instrumental texture analysis is an effective method to determine the quality of the potato. In this study Salome, Ditta and Asterix cultivars were cooked to 95.0 °C and 96.0 °C temperatures by steam cooking and conventional cooking method where the potatoes are placed in a boiling water. Sensory, ash, dry matter and textural analysis was performed. The cultivar difference on Salome, Ditta and Asterix has caused on the quality of the cooked potatoes to be evaluated differently. The cooking method and temperature has affected the sensory quality of the potatoes. The dry matter and the ash content of all potatoes has no significant difference between Salome, Ditta and Asterix cultivars. It can be concluded that Salome potatoes cooked by steam cooking to 95.0 °C for 30.0 minutes has the impression of better quality in terms of hardness, mealiness and total appearance than Ditta and Asterix cultivars. The sensory evaluation of the potatoes gives a very distinguished result among the independent treatments while some of the instrumental texture analysis results are not. For further studies, it is recommended to have samples of the potatoes collected and treated uniformly starting from the harvesting time as well as with the different set up of the texture analyzer.