Abstract
The taste preference for various sour dishes, prepared by the addition of one of the purified organic acids as the major sour component, was studied by a sensory evaluation panel comprised of female college students. The sour dishes were sushi rice, Japanese sunomono salad, tofu with a dip of ponzu shoyu (a mixture of citrus-based sauce and soy sauce), honey juice and yogurt drink, and the selected organic acids were gluconic acid, citric acid, acetic acid and lactic acid. Together with citric acid as the results, gluconic acid was significantly preferred over the other organic acids in the yogurt drink. Also, when gluconic acid was added to vinegary dressing at the final concentration of 10% (W/V) as the new recipe (half the amount of salt), there was no difference in terms of preferences of sushi rice between a normal recipe having little gluconic acid and the new recipe. Gluconic acid is a food additive, therefore, the manufacturing study of brewed vinegar, containing a large amount of gluconic acid, as a food was carried out, and by using Gluconacetobacter xylinum and a rotary shaking culture, gluconic acid was accumulated to 9% (W/V) in a 220hr cultivation, and the remaining acetic acid was negligible in the medium. These results suggest that it is possible to produce a new sushi vinegar (vinegary dressing for the rice) having a low salt content and pre-biotics (gluconic acid), but that it is difficult to offer gluconic acid as a mere acidifier of food additives without using other organic acids.
