Résumé
In the worldwide context of healthy diet, taste enhancement is essential to maintain low salt food acceptability. Aroma-taste interactions and heterogeneous distribution of tastants were used as strategies for taste enhancement. However, the combination of these two strategies has never been studied. This study investigated the effect of heterogeneous aroma-salt distribution on salty taste enhancement and consumer acceptability of hot snacks. A four-layers cream-based model food was designed with the same total amount of sodium and ham aroma, but their distribution varied in each layer. Low, medium or large contrasts between layers of salt and aroma concentration were used, according to an optimized experimental design. Control products with no added ham aroma were included, which resulted in 10 products. A consumer panel (n=82) rated for each product: salty, sweet, bitter, sour and umami taste intensity, as well as ham and cheese aroma intensity. Additionally, they evaluated their acceptability for the products during another sensory session. Results showed first that ham aroma enhanced saltiness (p<0.07) in homogeneous product compared to the control containing salt only. Secondly, products with the largest contrast in salt concentration were perceived more salty (p<0.01), regardless of the distribution of the ham aroma. Thirdly, the product with the largest contrasts in salt and aroma concentration, i.e. distributed on extreme layers, was even perceived as saltier than the product containing 20% more salt homogeneously distributed. Interestingly, consumer acceptability did not differ significantly between all products. This set of results led us to conclude that a well-designed heterogeneous distribution of salt and aroma in hot snacks could compensate for at least 20% of salt reduction, while maintaining salt perception and food acceptability.