A comparison of instrumental techniques used to discriminate the cooking quality of spaghetti

Abstract

Pasta is a popular food and various testing instruments have been developed to evaluate its texture. Local consumer preference for pasta texture varies, and it is necessary to correlate instrumental techniques with these preferences. However, with increasing international trade in durum grain and pasta, standardised methods are becoming more important. The firmness of cooked pasta is an important measure and there is no comparative information about how the different instrumental methods to measure firmness relate. This study aimed to (1) compare different instrumental methods (texture analyser, TA.XT2i, viscoelastograph and the GRL tenderness tester) to measure the texture of 30 spaghetti samples (2) to compare results of three laboratories using the same test to measure two aspects of texture, specifically firmness and stickiness. Each of the samples were evaluated for pasta quality in three different laboratories using in-house procedures (cook time, TA.XT2i firmness and in two labs stickiness and TPA analysis and in one lab. viscoelastograph and GRL cooking quality parameter [CQP]). This study has found close agreement between CQP, viscoelastograph and TA.XT2i to measure cooked spaghetti firmness but not so for stickiness. However, even using the same instrument to measure firmness (TA.XT2i) there were differences in the ranking of samples that fell between the extremes and in discrimination. We attribute these differences to variations in the cooking method, sample presentation and instrument settings used by the three labs. Optimum conditions need to be defined and standardised, followed by inter-laboratory evaluation to produce a consistent method that could be used internationally.