Validation Study to Evaluate the Use of Acoustic Tribology to Assess Mouthfeel of Dairy Drinks

Dairy-based beverages contain fat and sugars. As both contribute to the energy intake upon consumption, food industry strives to reduce these ingredients while maintaining the taste, texture and aroma properties of the beverages. A successful reduction of fat and sugar from drinks has still proven a great challenge since consumers have less preference for the mouth feel of reformulated beverages than for the regular beverages. Mainly because instrumental measures like rheology and traditional tribology do not entirely predict the experienced mouth feel, there is an interest in alternative correlates for mouth feel aspects related to fat and sugar perception. In a recent study it was demonstrated that vibrations produced during interaction between the tongue, palate and beverages during consumption are very sensitive to the amount of fat and texturizers in the beverage. The present study aims at clarifying that relation for a larger panel of human subjects, by systematically evaluating vibration spectra during consumption of dairy beverages that differ in fat content, sugar content or pH. Secondly, the correlation of vibration spectra (acoustic tribology) with mouth feel-related sensory properties and composition of fat deposits on the tongue will be assessed.