SUGAR REDUCTION IN BISCUITS WITHOUT SWEETENER REPLACEMENT BALANCED BY AROMA INCREASE

There is an increase search for new foods due to health concerns. Consumers are looking for sugar reduced products and producers must attend this demand without losing sensory quality. Studies showed modal interactions between substances related to taste and aroma (Mello et al, 2019). Sugar reduction in foods and beverages without sweetener replacement could be balanced by aroma increase, without losing sensory acceptance. The objective of this study was to check the possibility of reducing sugar addition in biscuits without sweetener replacement, but balanced by aroma increase. Biscuits were produced following a complete factorial design with two independent variables in two levels each: sugar reduction (5.82% and 34.18% of sugar reduction) and vanilla aroma concentration (0.22% and 1.28%). Dependent variables were acceptance (n=120) regarding overall impression, appearance, aroma, flavor and texture, using an 9-point hedonic structured scale. ANOVAs were applied for each dependent variable considering three factors: sugar reduction, aroma concentration (fixed) and consumer (random), besides interaction between sugar reduction and aroma; ANOVAs were followed by Fisher LSD test, all at 5% significance. Consumers were also segmented using hierarchical agglomerative cluster analysis with Euclidian distance and Ward’s method. Results demonstrated significant and negative effect of sugar reduction, and lower sugar concentrations decrease biscuits acceptance, and this effect was higher for flavor acceptance. Aroma concentration was significant only for aroma and texture acceptances, and higher aroma concentrations increase aroma acceptance and decrease texture acceptance. There were no significant interactions. However, one segmented group presented significant interaction for flavor acceptance, in which a higher sugar reduction (34.18%) had a higher acceptance when the aroma concentration was higher (1.28%). Next, project will study wider concentrations ranges in order to deeper investigate the possible interactions between sugar and aroma concentrations, aiming at producing biscuits with less sugar without losing sensory acceptance, balance by aromas.