Development of a Sensory Lexicon for Gluten Free Crackers Commercially Available in the United States

With the rapidly expanding gluten-free crackers (GFC) market, it is important to understand their sensory properties for product development, marketing, and consumer acceptance. Until now, no research has developed a broadly applicable sensory lexicon of commercial plain/original GFC. This work used 10 plain GFC for descriptive analysis, based on seven different main flours (tapioca, cassava, white rice, brown rice, nut flour blend, millet flour blend, and jasmine rice). The crackers were evaluated by five highly trained panelists using a consensus method and a 150-point scale with 1.0 increments for intensity quantification. Three qualitative and 44 quantitative characteristics (10 appearance, 27 flavor, and seven texture attributes) were developed along with definitions and references. Visual (thickness, roughness, and shininess), texture (thickness, hardness, fracturability, grittiness, dryness/moisture absorbency, tooth packing, and astringency), and flavors (salt, sweet, starch complex, toasted, cardboard, and gluten character) were present in practically all samples. Other attributes such as dairy, coconut, seaweed, soy sauce, and black pepper were present only in certain crackers. Principal component analysis (PCA) showed that crackers with the same flour type were not necessarily positioned close, showing the distinct sensory profiles even when formulated with the same flour base. The PCA for appearance and texture attributes explained 56.65% variability, mainly originating from the amount of seeds, size of seeds, roughness, and hardness. Similarly, the aroma and flavor PCA explained 49.1% variability, characterized by earthy, cardboard, burnt, nutty, oily, and salty. The lexicon offers a standardized blueprint of sensory properties for the plain GFC industry that can be used to profile similar products in the market.