Industry: Food and Beverage
Instrument: HT3 Static and Dynamic Headspace System
Dynamic Headspace Analysis of Coffees and Teas
Coffee and tea are more than just caffeine, as both multibillion dollar businesses will attest. The unique flavors and aromas associated with foods and beverages are due to the presence of complex combinations of volatile organic compounds. In this analysis, there is no single compound that gives a food product it’s distinctive flavor and smell, hence, the desire to have an even more comprehensive flavor profile for each product.
Although coffee is more than caffeine, it is important to be able to analyze the semivolatile caffeine in beans, as EC regulations require the amount of caffeine in a decaffeinated beverage to be less than 0.1% (by dry weight). The decaffeination process may involve the use of a class2
solvent and then that should be analyzed as well. It is also important to know the levels of the volatile aroma compounds because of the potential of coffee fraud. The adulteration of high quality coffee beans mixed with poorer ones can lead to an inferior product, yet the buyer could not be sure without analyzing the volatile aromas.
Headspace analysis of volatile compounds offers many benefits. Some of those being are a cleaner analysis, potentially quicker run times, and elimination of possible system contamination from high concentrated samples. By incorporating EPA approved trapping techniques, the HT3 Headspace sampler is now capable of offering purge & trap analytic performance. This application note will describe the methodology and present a comprehensive compound list for each caffeinated beverage.
Column Oven and Detector Gain and Mass
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