Craft beer: An overview.

The purpose of the work was to provide an overview on craft beer. Details and issues concerning history and legal definition market, fiscal policy, innovation, safety, healthiness, consumer profile, and sustainability are supplied. The term "craft brewery" generally refers to a brewery able to produce low volumes of beer, often made with traditional ingredients-for emulating historic styles-but also with the addition of nontraditional ingredients as a distinctiveness sign of the master brewer. In many countries, the importance of the company size is related to the opportunity to take advantage of reduced excise rates for low production volumes. In several countries, another important requisite of a craft brewery is represented by its independence from other alcohol industry members. Even in the presence of a great heterogeneity of the size of craft breweries in the various countries, their number in the world is around 17,000. Craft beer is mainly consumed in restaurants and bars. Innovation of craft beer concerns aspects, such as ingredients, alcohol content, aging, and packaging, and the profile of the typical craft beer drinker is that of a young man, with a higher education and a medium-high income. Craft beers are often not filtered/not pasteurized and, for these reasons, they are beverages rich in health compounds but with a reduced shelf life. As in the case of larger breweries, the environmental impact of craft breweries is mainly represented by water consumption and production of liquid and solid wastes.

Discrimination of flavoured olive oil based on hyperspectral imaging.

The aim of the work was to use the hyperspectral imaging as an analytical tool for the classification of flavoured olive oils, according to composition of the starting blends, crop season, flavouring methods, and flavouring agent. For this reason, in the crop season 2013-2014, three mono-cultivar extra virgin olive oils (Coratina, Peranzana, Ogliarola) were used in different proportions to produce three blends, which were successively flavoured by infusion. From each blend, 3 types of flavoured olive oils were produced: basil, chilli pepper, and garlic + chilli pepper. In the crop season 2014-2015, the study was limited to one of the blends used in the previous season and the basil, chilli pepper, and garlic + chilli pepper flavoured olive oils were produced by infusion or by malaxation. Blends and flavoured oils were submitted to hyperspecral imaging in the 400-1000 nm region. To discriminate the oil samples, ANOVA analysis was performed at each wavelength. Wavelengths in the range 400-570 nm and around 695 nm allowed the discrimination of samples.

Antioxidant Compounds from Vegetable Matrices: Biosynthesis, Occurrence, and Extraction Systems.

Natural antioxidants such as vitamin C, tocopherols and tocotrienols, carotenoids, and phenolic compounds are largely distributed in plant products. Most of them are not synthesized by human and need to be introduced with diet according to the Recommended Daily Intake (RDI). This work was aimed to give a comprehensive overview on the occurrence of these antioxidants in plants, in particular in plant foods, on the mechanisms of biosynthesis, and on conventional (liquid-liquid or solid-liquid extraction, Soxhlet) and innovative (enzymatic-assisted, pressurized fluid, supercritical fluid, ultrasound-assisted, microwave-assisted, pulsed electric field) extraction systems.

Wine Processing: A Critical Review of Physical, Chemical, and Sensory Implications of Innovative Vinification Procedures.

Wine is one of the most popular alcoholic beverages in the world, although it is mainly consumed in European and South American countries. Several thousand years have passed since the product of grape fermentation was accidentally discovered. Over the last 100-150 years, winemaking has been completely revolutionized in terms of procedures and equipment. This work is aimed to give a comprehensive overview of the consolidated use of winemaking innovations that are still in the development stage or already applied to commercial products. Their effects on physical, chemical, and sensory characteristics of wines will also be discussed in comparison with the consolidated vinification procedures.

Phenolic content, physical and sensory properties of breads made with different types of barley wort.

BACKGROUND: Barley wort, an intermediate product of beer brewing, is rich in phenolic compounds. The aim of this work was to evaluate the possibility of increasing the antioxidant content of bread by replacing water with three types of wort: two of them withdrawn at the end of the mashing operation during the production of a Pilsner and a Double Malt Pilsner beer respectively; the other collected at an intermediate stage of mashing of the Pilsner beer. The chemical, physical and sensory properties of the wort-added breads were compared with those of a control bread. RESULTS: All three worts led to increased phenolic content, volume and specific volume of the breads and induced significant changes in 11 of 23 sensory descriptors. The highest phenolic contents were detected in breads made either with the Pilsner wort withdrawn at an intermediate stage of mashing or with the Double Malt Pilsner wort. The former also gave the highest increase in volume and specific volume but significantly reduced the scores for crunchiness, firmness and cohesiveness. The latter led to lower increases in volume and specific volume, but less significant changes in the sensory properties were associated with its use. CONCLUSION: Worts can be conveniently used to increase the antioxidant content of bread. However, different types of wort can modify to different extents the physical and sensory properties of the product.

Recovery of biomolecules from food wastes--a review.

Food wastes are produced by a variety of sources, ranging from agricultural operations to household consumption. About 38% occurs during food processing. At present, the European Union legislation encourages the exploitation of co-products. This valorisation can be achieved through the extraction of high-value components such as proteins, polysaccharides, fibres, flavour compounds, and phytochemicals, which can be re-used as nutritionally and pharmacologically functional ingredients. Extraction can proceed according to solid-liquid extraction, Soxhlet extraction, pressurized fluid extraction, supercritical fluid extraction, ultrasound-assisted extraction, microwave-assisted extraction, pulsed electric field extraction, and enzyme-assisted extraction. Nevertheless, these techniques cannot be used indiscriminately and their choice depends on the type of biomolecules and matrix, the scale processing (laboratory or industrial), the ratio between production costs and economic values of the compounds to be extracted. The vegetable wastes include trimmings, peelings, stems, seeds, shells, bran, residues remaining after extraction of oil, starch, sugar, and juice. The animal-derived wastes include wastes from bred animals, wastes from seafood, wastes from dairy processing. The recovered biomolecules and by-products can be used to produce functional foods or as adjuvants in food processing or in medicinal and pharmaceutical preparations. This work is an overview of the type and amounts of food wastes; food waste legislation; conventional and novel techniques suitable for extracting biomolecules; food, medicinal and pharmaceutical uses of the recovered biomolecules and by-products, and future trends in these areas.

Ochratoxin A released back into the medium by Saccharomyces cerevisiae as a function of the strain, washing medium and fermentative conditions.

BACKGROUND: This study was aimed at investigating the removal of ochratoxin A (OTA) by two wild strains of Saccharomyces cerevisiae (W20 and W30) in a semi-synthetic medium under two temperatures (25, 30 °C) and sugar levels (200, 250 g L(-1) ), as well as the stability of OTA-yeast complex by evaluating the amount of bound toxin released back after some washing treatments with phosphate-buffered saline (PBS) or model wine (MW). In addition, the main products of fermentation were studied. RESULTS: Both W20 and W30 strains reduced OTA with removal percentages of 5.41-49.58%, and this process was affected by temperature and sugar concentration. Concerning the stability of the OTA-yeast complex, the amount of bound toxin decreased by 20-99% after five passes of washing, with a strong strain dependence and an effect of temperature and sugar concentration only for the W30 isolate. In addition, the two strains showed interesting technological properties in terms of fermentation products in a semi-synthetic medium (high ethanol yield, volatile acidity as acetic acid < 1.2 g L(-1) ; glycerol production exceeding 5.2 g L(-1) ). CONCLUSIONS: Apart from the removal of OTA, release of the toxin is a variable process and relies upon the strain effect; a significance of the other factors of the design (sugar concentration, temperature) was found only for a single isolate. Thus evaluation of the stability of the complex yeasts/OTA should be an additional trait to select promising functional yeasts.

In-depth analysis of volatolomic and odorous profiles of novel craft beer by permutation test features selection and multivariate correlation analysis.

This research explored the impact of binary cereal blends [barley with durum wheat (DW) and soft wheat (CW)], four autochthonous yeast strains (9502, 9518, 14061 and 17290) and two refermentation sugar concentrations (6-9 g/L), on volatolomics (VOCs) and odour profiles of craft beers using unsupervised statistics. For the first time, we applied permutation test to select volatiles with higher significance in explaining variance among samples. The unsupervised approach on the 19 selected VOCs revealed cereal-yeast interaction to be the main source of variability and DW-9502-6/9, DW-17290-6, CW-17290-6 and CW-9518-6 being the best technological strategies. In particular, in samples DW-9502-6/9, concentrations of some of the selected volatiles were observed to be approximately three to more than seven times higher than the average. PLS-correlation between VOCs and odour profiles proved to be very useful in assessing the weight of each of the selected VOCs on the perception of odour notes.

Quantitative descriptive analysis as a strategic tool in research activities relating to innovative meat tenderisation technologies.

Sensory analysis plays a significant role in developing innovative technology from prototype to industrial stage, and above all, in the meat industry. The starting hypothesis is that the quantitative descriptive analysis is crucial to optimise an innovative process for tenderising meat before the scale-up stage because it provides information that instrumental and consumer science analyses cannot achieve. With this in mind, the present study describes the detailed protocol of the quantitative descriptive analysis, which was developed and optimised to contribute to the prototype development stage of new meat tenderising technology. This study applied the quantitative descriptive analysis to evaluate the sensory characteristics of semitendinosus beef meats submitted to the tenderising process by combining exogenous enzymes and ultra-sound radiation treatments. A correlation analysis was performed among sensory and instrumental data. A significant and negative correlation was found only among texture parameters evaluated by sensory and instrumental parameters (R > -0.81 and P < 0.05). Conversely, no significant correlation (P > 0.05) was found between sensory and instrumental chromatic characteristics. Moreover, the quantitative descriptive analysis was a valuable tool because it provided precious information on the appearance of the treated raw meat (score less than 6), which was not detected by instrumental analyses. This information is precious because the appearance of raw meat is fundamental to the consumer buying decision process. Based on the results obtained through sensory analysis, we could highlight the necessity of optimising technological processing before the industrialisation stage to avoid a probable failure of this production method when applied to the market.

Optimisation of quality features of new wheat beers fermented through sequential inoculation of non-Saccharomyces and Saccharomyces yeasts.

The choice of the starchy ingredients as well as that of the yeasts strongly can represent a useful tool to differentiate the final beers. Our research investigated twelve white beers obtained applying a 2-factor mixed 3-level/4-level experimental design. The first factor was the cereal mixture, with 3 combinations of barley malt (65 %) and unmalted wheat (35 % of common, durum, or emmer). The second factor was the yeast used to carry out the fermentation trials, i.e.: a S. cerevisiae starter strain (WB06); an oenological S. cerevisiae strain (9502); two mixed starters made of an oenological Schizosaccharomyces pombe strain (6956) and, alternatively, one of the two S. cerevisiae strains. Most beer attributes were significantly (p < 0.05) influenced by the two considered factors with the following exceptions: the wheat species did not affect maltotriose, maltose, pH, total and volatile acidity, floral flavour, and sweetness; the yeast did not exert significant effects on foam colour, turbidity, overall olfactory intensity, yeast flavour, and body. The flavour of fruits and aromatic herbs were not influenced by the factors studied. Alcohol content was maximised using the unmalted durum wheat (∼7 %) and S. cerevisiae WB06 (∼6.8 %). The beer antioxidant content was increased by the use of emmer (566 mg/L) and by the application of the mixed inoculum (478-487 mg/L). The beers made with unmalted common wheat and fermented by the S. cerevisiae strains alone obtained the best overall sensory score (3.7). As shown by the Principal Component Analysis, the beers were better classified by the type of unmalted wheat than by the fermenting yeast. A multiple regression analysis was performed by fitting the analytical parameters that highlighted significant differences among the beers to a second-order polynomial model. Data concerning colour, glycerol concentration, FC-TPC, and antioxidant activity were satisfactorily predicted (R2 > 0.8) by the fitted models.

The Value of Craft Beer Styles: Evidence from the Italian Market.

This study aims to estimate the market value, or implicit prices, associated with the main craft beer attributes (e.g., beer style, organic, gluten-free, and package-related features) and support producers in detecting the more profitable marketing strategies. For this purpose, we conducted an empirical analysis employing sales data of craft beers from the Italian online market, and we estimated a hedonic price model via ordinary least squares. Results show that the type of package and cup only has moderate effects on price. Furthermore, a moderate premium price is found for gluten-free craft beers, while craft beers with organic labels and Italian origin do not benefit from the higher price. Instead, the beer style adopted strongly affected the product price: the highest premium prices were detected for Barleywine (+49.9%) and Italian Grape Ale (+39.6%) beer styles. Furthermore, relevant premium prices, higher than +25%, were estimated for other beer styles such as Sour, Fruit Beer, and Stout. Results suggest that artisanal breweries can effectively differentiate their product according to the beer style. To the best of our knowledge, the current study offers the first empirical evidence on how beer styles as well as other product characteristics affect the market price of craft beer by using secondary data.

Functional Bread Produced in a Circular Economy Perspective: The Use of Brewers' Spent Grain.

Brewers' spent grain (BSG) is the main by-product of the brewing industry, corresponding to ~85% of its solid residues. The attention of food technologists towards BSG is due to its content in nutraceutical compounds and its suitability to be dried, ground, and used for bakery products. This work was aimed to investigate the use of BSG as a functional ingredient in bread-making. BSGs were characterised for formulation (three mixtures of malted barley and unmalted durum (Da), soft (Ri), or emmer (Em) wheats) and origin (two cereal cultivation places). The breads enriched with two different percentages of each BSG flour and gluten were analysed to evaluate the effects of replacements on their overall quality and functional characteristics. Principal Component Analysis homogeneously grouped BSGs by type and origin and breads into three sets: the control bread, with high values of crumb development, a specific volume, a minimum and maximum height, and cohesiveness; Em breads, with high values of IDF, TPC, crispiness, porosity, fibrousness, and wheat smell; and the group of Ri and Da breads, which have high values of overall smell intensity, toasty smell, pore size, crust thickness, overall quality, a darker crumb colour, and intermediate TPC. Based on these results, Em breads had the highest concentrations of nutraceuticals but the lowest overall quality. Ri and Da breads were the best choice (intermediate phenolic and fibre contents and overall quality comparable to that of control bread). Practical applications: the transformation of breweries into biorefineries capable of turning BSG into high-value, low-perishable ingredients; the extensive use of BSGs to increase the production of food commodities; and the study of food formulations marketable with health claims.

Assessment of the impact of unmalted cereals, hops, and yeast strains on volatolomic and olfactory profiles of Blanche craft beers: A chemometric approach.

This study investigated the impact of changes in craft beer formulation, by modifying the unmalted cereal [(durum (Da) and soft (Ri) wheat), emmer (Em)], hops [Cascade (Ca) and Columbus (Co)], and yeast strains [M21 (Wi) - M02 (Ci)], on volatolomic, acidic, and olfactory profiles. Olfactory attributes were evaluated by the trained panel. Volatolomic and acidic profiles were determined by GC-MS. The sensory analysis detected significant differences for 5 attributes, including olfactory intensity and finesse, malty, herbaceous, and floral notes. Multivariate analysis of volatiles data, showed significant differences among the samples (p < 0.05). DaCaWi, DaCoWi, and RiCoCi beers differ from the others by their higher concentrations of esters, alcohols, and terpenes. A PLSC analysis was carried out between volatiles and odour attributes. As far as we know, this is the first investigation that shed light on the impact of 3-factors interaction on the sensory-volatolomic profile of craft beers, through a comprehensive multivariate approach.

A multivariate approach to explore the volatolomic and sensory profiles of craft Italian Grape Ale beers produced with novel Saccharomyces cerevisiae strains.

This study investigated the influence of three Saccharomyces cerevisiae strains, selected from different matrices - CHE-3 (cherry), P4 (sourdough) and TA4-10 (grape must) - on characteristics of Italian Grape Ale (IGA) beers obtained at microbrewery scale. A multidisciplinary approach, combining results from analysis of chemical, volatile and organoleptic profiles of the beers, was adopted to underline the relationships between yeast starter and the quality of final products. Detection volatile organic compounds (VOCs) by Gas-Chromatography coupled with Mass Spectrometry (GC-MS) after extraction carried out by head-space micro-extraction (HS-SPME) revealed that the beer obtained by P4 strain differed from the others for its higher concentrations of esters, alcohols, and terpenes as confirmed by PCA (principal component analysis) and Cluster heatmap. Furthermore, sensorial analysis and consumer test showed that this sample differed from others by more pronounced notes of "fruity smell and floral" and "olfactory finesse," and it was the most appreciated beer for smell, taste, and overall quality. Conversely, CHE-3 was the sample with the lowest concentrations of the identified volatiles and, together TA4-10, showed the highest scores for smoked, yeast, malt, and hop notes. As far as we know, these are the first results on the application of indigenous S. cerevisiae strains in the production of craft IGA beers analyzed through a complex multivariate approach.

Effects of cultivar and process variables on dynamic-mechanical and sensorial behavior of value-added grape-based smoothies.

The effects of either cooking temperature (45, 80, and 100 °C) or inclusion of seed particles on the dynamic-mechanical and sensorial properties of value-added Crimson seedless, Black Pearl, or Baresana grape-based smoothies were studied. The inclusion of seed particles resulted in significant increases of the phenolic content, both in Black Pearl and Baresana, but it did not affect in a negative way the sensorial characteristics of smoothies whereas it caused an increase of the viscoelastic behavior of Black Pearl and a slight decrease in Baresana grape-based smoothies. In particular, the investigated rheological parameters were the loss and storage modulus. Moreover, the loss tangent value (the ratio between loss and storage modulus) remained unchanged, indicating a pseudoplastic behavior of all samples, independent on the process conditions. The smoothies produced from Crimson grapes at the intermediate temperature (80 °C) showed sensorial and rheological characteristics similar to those manufactured at 45 °C and better than those manufactured at 100 °C.

Effects of bud load on quality of Beogradska besemena and Thompson seedless table grapes and cultivar differentiation based on chemometrics of analytical indices.

BACKGROUND: The effects of bud load on the quality of Beogradska besemena and Thompson seedless table grape cultivars were studied. Two pruning treatments were imposed: 44 and 18 buds per vine for Beogradska besemena and 44 and 22 buds per vine for Thompson seedless. RESULTS: In Beogradska besemena the reduction of bud load decreased titratable acidity (-4%), skin dry weight (-16%) and malic and citric acid contents (-43 and - 20%) and increased tartaric acid content (14%). The decrease in pulp antioxidant activity (-36%) was related to the decrease in hydroxycinnamoyl tartaric acid content (-13%). Concerning skin, the reduction of bud load decreased catechin and caffeoyl tartaric acid contents (-42 and - 40%) and significantly increased rutin and quercetin-3-O-glucopyranoside contents as specific compounds and flavonoids and proanthocyanidins (9 and 21%) as classes of compounds, thus causing an increase in antioxidant activity (6%). In Thompson seedless the reduction of bud load increased soluble solid content (7%), acidity (9%) and concentrations of the three organic acids (7, 3 and 14%). The increase in pulp antioxidant activity (25%) could be attributed to the increase in total phenolics (69%). The reduction of bud load caused a significant decrease in quercetin-3-O-glucopyranoside (-26%) and antioxidant activity (-15%) in skin. Principal component analysis allowed good separation between samples of the two cultivars, independently of bud level. CONCLUSION: The results indicate that the effects of different bud loads are cultivar-dependent. Bud load and genotype differences were shown to dramatically impact the quality and antioxidant properties of table grape.

A Mathematical Modeling of Freezing Process in the Batch Production of Ice Cream.

This study deals with the mathematical modeling of crystallization kinetics occurring during batch production of the ice cream. The temperature decrease was recorded in-situ through a computerized wireless system. A robust pattern-recognition algorithm of the experimental cooling curves was developed to determine the initial freezing point. The theoretical freezing point was used to calibrate the whole time-temperature profile. Finally, a modified Gompertz's function was used to describe the main steps of crystallization kinetics. Derivative analysis of the Gompertz's function allowed to determine the time-temperature physical markers of dynamic nucleation, ice crystal growth and air whipping. Composition and freezing properties were used as input variables in multivariate analysis to classification purposes of the ice cream mixtures as a function of their ability to produce high-quality ice cream. The numerical analysis of the whole cooling curve was used to build predictive models of the ice cream quality indices.

Removal Ability and Resistance to Cinnamic and Vanillic Acids by Fungi.

Twelve fungal strains were assayed to investigate their resistance to cinnamic and vanillic acids and their ability to remove these compounds from a liquid medium. In a first step, the effect of the two aromatic acids (1 g/L) on the fungal growth kinetic was studied. The results were modelled through a logistic like function (Dantigny equation) to estimate τ, which is the time to the half-maximum colony diameter. The key findings of this part were as follows: (i) generally, cinnamic acid exerted a stronger effect than vanillic acid; (ii) aromatic acids exerted a delay on the growth of some fungi and only one strain (Athelia rolfsii) was completely inhibited. In the second part, fungi were assayed to investigate their ability to remove cinnamic and vanillic acids (ca. 350 mg/kg) from liquid media at pH 3.5. The results indicated that the most efficient fungi were Aspergillus niger and Lasiodiplodia theobromae.

Effect of infusion of spices into the oil vs. combined malaxation of olive paste and spices on quality of naturally flavoured virgin olive oils.

Olive oil flavouring with aromatic plants and spices is a traditional practice in Mediterranean gastronomy. The aim of this work was to compare the influence of two different flavouring techniques (infusion of spices into the oil vs. combined malaxation of olives paste and spices) on chemical and sensory quality of flavoured olive oil. In particular, oxidative and hydrolytic degradation (by routine and non-conventional analyses), phenolic profiles (by HPLC), volatile compounds (by SPME-GC/MS), antioxidant activity, and sensory properties (by a trained panel and by consumers) of the oils were evaluated. The obtained results evidenced that the malaxation method was more effective in extracting the phenolic compounds, with a significantly lower level of hydrolysis of secoiridoids. As a consequence, antioxidant activity was significantly lower in the oils obtained by infusion, which were characterized by a higher extent of the oxidative degradation. The volatile compounds were not significantly influenced by changing the flavouring method, apart for sulfur compounds that were more abundant in the oils obtained by the combined malaxation method. From a sensory point of view, more intense bitter and pungent tastes were perceived when the infusion method was adopted.

Differential Adsorption of Ochratoxin A and Anthocyanins by Inactivated Yeasts and Yeast Cell Walls during Simulation of Wine Aging.

The adsorption of ochratoxin A (OTA) by yeasts is a promising approach for the decontamination of musts and wines, but some potential competitive or interactive phenomena between mycotoxin, yeast cells, and anthocyanins might modify the intensity of the phenomenon. The aim of this study was to examine OTA adsorption by two strains of Saccharomyces cerevisiae (the wild strain W13, and the commercial isolate BM45), previously inactivated by heat, and a yeast cell wall preparation. Experiments were conducted using Nero di Troia red wine contaminated with 2 µg/L OTA and supplemented with yeast biomass (20 g/L). The samples were analyzed periodically to assess mycotoxin concentration, chromatic characteristics, and total anthocyanins over 84 days of aging. Yeast cell walls revealed the highest OTA-adsorption in comparison to thermally-inactivated cells (50% vs. 43% toxin reduction), whilst no significant differences were found for the amount of adsorbed anthocyanins in OTA-contaminated and control wines. OTA and anthocyanins adsorption were not competitive phenomena. Unfortunately, the addition of yeast cells to wine could cause color loss; therefore, yeast selection should also focus on this trait to select the best strain.