A search for the ideal flavor of strawberry - Comparison of consumer acceptance and metabolite patterns in Fragaria × ananassa Duch.

in strawberry. Despite numerous investigations of the metabolic composition of strawberries, the description of the relationship between flavor pattern and consumer acceptance is inconsistent.The aim of the present study was to correlate overall liking (acceptance), the intensity of important sensory parameters, which were evaluated by a consumer panel, and data of instrumental analyses like soluble solids content, titratable acidity and volatile organic compound patterning. The data were collected over a period of three harvest years. They are suitable to reveal the relationships and interactions between the metabolite patterns of strawberry and the sensory properties due to the use of a high diversity of the gene pool and due to a special sample preparation with representative sample sizes for both human sensory and instrumental analysis. A high genetic diversity was considered including genotypes from cultivar crossing and from wild species introgression. It was found that the volatile compounds methyl 2-methylbutanoate, (Z)-3-hexenyl acetate, linalool and decanoic acid correlate positively with the attribute ‘sweet’ and, therefore, can act as sweetness enhancers. Furthermore, compounds were identified with positive (linalool, lactones) and negative impact (some esters, furanones) on the sensory quality. From these findings, strategies towards improved, sensorially valuable strawberry cultivars with a high consumer acceptance can be deduced. The online version of this article (doi: 10.5073/JABFQ.2016.089.029) contains supplementary files