Abstract
The increasing popularity of alcohol-free beers (AFBs) fosters the industry interest in delivering the best possible product. Yet, a remaining sensory defect of AFBs is the over-perception of wort flavour, caused by elevated concentrations of small volatile flavour compounds (i.e. aldehydes). Previously, molecular sieves (hydrophobic ZSM-5 type zeolites) were found most suitable to remove these flavours by adsorption with high selectivity from the AFBs. In this work, a flavour-improved beer is produced at pilot-scale using this novel technology, and its chemical composition, sensory profile and stability are evaluated against a reference. Aldehyde concentrations in the flavour-improved product were found 79–93% lower than in the reference. The distinct difference was confirmed with a trained sensory panel and could be conserved even after three months ageing at 30 °C. Future work will focus on the process design to scale up this technology.
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 450-458 |
Journal | Food and Bioproducts Processing |
Volume | 123 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - 2020 |
Keywords
- Adsorption
- Ageing
- Alcohol-free beer
- Aldehydes
- Sensory evaluation
- Wort flavour
- Zeolite