The importance of the recruitment method for androstenone sensitivity with respect to accurate sensory evaluation of androstenone tainted meat

Four European sensory panels where all (38) assessors, when recruited, were able to detect dry androstenone crystals through smelling, were reclassified in terms of sensitivity using a recently developed sensitivity method based both on the assessor’s ability to detect androstenone and the spontaneous descriptor used to describe the odour. The reclassification reduced the number of assumed androstenone sensitive assessors from 38 to 28. All 38 assessors evaluated 6 samples (at approx. 60 °C) of minced meat low in skatole (⩽0.05 ppm) with androstenone contents from 3 to 9 ppm. The 28 androstenone sensitive assessors were able to detect androstenone odour in samples with androstenone ⩾4.5 ppm and androstenone flavour in samples with androstenone ⩾3.7 ppm; all concentrations in the fat. The 10 insensitive assessors could not detect androstenone even at 9 ppm despite the fact that all assessors detected dry androstenone crystals. The 10 insensitive assessors were present in 3 panels, the panels then having from 50% to 88.8% sensitive assessors. This showed that the method of recruiting assessors to a sensory panel was critical for the evaluation of androstenone tainted meat.