CREAMY PERCEPTION II: IN MODEL SOUPS

Model cream soups prepared with different levels of several thickeners were evaluated by a panel who scored their liking of consistency, perceived creaminess and thickness. Their viscosities were measured with a Haake viscometer. The perceived thickness is linearly related to the logarithm of viscosity for all thickeners. Liking consistency shows a quadratic relation with viscosity. Perceived creaminess changes according to the type of thickener. The optimal values of viscosity and flow behaviour index for maximum creaminess and best liking consistency do not coincide. The viscosity and the flow behavior index affect the sensorial responses of liking consistency and creaminess. Response surfaces show that other rheological factors affect the model. The results for soups are compared with result for creams from a previous study. The viscosity for maximum creaminess is higher for creams than for soups while the flow behaviour is higher for soups than for creams.     

Effect of high intensity pulsed electric fields on enzymes and vitamins in bovine raw milk

Pulsed electric fields (PEF) were applied to fresh bovine raw milk using a laboratory-scale continuous PEF system to study the impact on selected native enzyme activities and on vitamin degradation. The activities of protease, lipase, alkaline phosphatase and lactoperoxidase following PEF treatment at electric field strengths ranging from 15 to 35 kV/cm for treatment times of 12.5 µs to 75 µs were examined. Reductions in enzyme activity, even under the most severe conditions employed, were quite modest, amounting to 14%, 37% and 29% for lipase, protease and alkaline phosphatase, respectively, while the activity of lactoperoxidase remained unchanged. The PEF treatment had no effect on the levels of thiamin, riboflavin, retinol and α-tocopherol in the milk .     

CREAMY PERCEPTION I: IN MODEL DESSERT CREAMS

Model caramel creams containing four levels of dairy fat and nine levels of xanthan gum as thickener were tasted and submitted to viscometric measurements. The panel of 15 tasters evaluated their liking of the consistency, the perceived creaminess and the thickness, using a magnitude estimation scoring method. Results were correlated with rheological parameters: viscosity and flow behavior index. There is a quadratic relationship between rheological parameters and both liking consistency and perceived creaminess, with an optimum value. The optimum liking does not coincide with that for maximum creaminess; these values depend on the amount of the two ingredients: fat content and thickener. They can be obtained from response surfaces. The perceived thickness is related to viscosity. Some modalities of changes in optimal values for different groups of people are considered.     

Shelf life of ice-stored redfish, Sebastes marinus and S. mentella

Redfish ( Sebastes marinus and S. mentella ) were caught by an Icelandic trawler, stored at about 0°C in boxes in the hold and landed in a German fishing harbour. Boxed redfish, differing in storage time on board, were subsequently stored in melting ice in the chill store of the laboratory at a temperature of +4°C until the borderline of saleability was reached. the quality loss of the ice-stored redfish was monitored by a number of chemical, physical and microbiological parameters including volatile base nitrogen (TVB-N), trimethylamine (TMA), trimethylamine oxide (TMAO), creatine, ethanol, Fishtester readings and number of cfu. AH parameters were correlated with sensory analysis and time in ice.
The rate of deterioration of iced redfish depended on the conditions of storage. Sensory analysis was the most accurate indicator of the limit of saleability of redfish. Iced redfish, stored mainly in a chill store (4–5°C) onshore, had a shelf-life of 16 to 19 days from catching. Fish stored at 0.5°C in the hold of the fishing vessel had a shelf-life of 22 days: These results reflect the different storage temperatures and the effects of handling, transport and storage damage on the quality of the fish. the Fishtester proved to be very useful for the determination of deterioration. Measuring ethanol, TVB-N and TMA gave no information about quality changes during the first 12 days of storage.     

Integrating Neural and Symbolic Approaches: A Symbolic Learning Scheme for a Connectionist Associative Memory

This paper deals with the integration of neural and symbolic approaches. It focuses on associative memories where a connectionist architecture tries to provide a storage and retrieval component for the symbolic level. In this light, the classic model for associative memory, the Hopfield network is briefly reviewed. Then, a new model for associative memory, the hybrid Hopfield-clique network is presented in detail. Its application to a typically symbolic task, the post -processing of the output of an optical character recognizer, is also described. In the author's view, the hybrid Hopfield -clique network constitutes an example of a successful integration of the two approaches. It uses a symbolic learning scheme to train a connectionist network, and through this integration, it can provide perfect storage and recall. As a conclusion, an analysis of what can be learned from this specific architecture is attempted. In the case of this model, a guarantee for perfect storage and recall can only be given because it was possible to analyze the problem using the well-defined symbolic formalism of graph theory. In general, we think that finding an adequate formalism for a given problem is an important step towards solving it.