Sensory profile and volatile molecules as quality markers of cold pressed vegetable oils

Especially in some European market, cold pressed sunflower and hazelnut oils are high appreciated by organic consumers or by consumers who do not like the taste of virgin olive oil. The overall quality related with the oil extraction technology applied can be very heterogeneous and not well descripted and promoted thus making the consumer uncertain and confused. To fill these gaps, a large set of cold pressed hazelnut and sunflower oils, with different features in terms of price, agricultural system and origin, were collected from the Italian large scale retail trade. First of all, in order to characterize the sensory quality of the products, a quantitative descriptive analysis (QDA®) was performed: many sensory descriptors were selected and quantified by a trained panel, allowing a detailed profiling of the oils. The volatile profiles, determined by solid phase microextraction - gas chromatographic coupled to mass spectrometry (SPME-GC/MS) was also studied, focusing on the presence of specific compounds responsible for peculiar positive sensory notes or negative sensory attributes. Moreover, all the chemical and sensory data were elaborated by using a statistical approach, with the aim to find correlations among the parameters and to characterize samples according to relevant quality parameters and trying to find peculiar sensory notes and molecules as possible markers to characterize and describe cold pressed oils of high quality. The research was carried out with the financial contribution of the Italian Ministry of the Instruction, University and Research in the framework of the PRIN project ‘‘Innovative technologic applications to improve the extraction yield of virgin oils from olives and seeds and for rapid controls of their quality’’.