Quantitation of Twelve Metals in Tequila and Mezcal Spirits as Authenticity Parameters

Abstract

In this paper the differentiation of silver, gold, aged and extra-aged tequila and mezcal has been carried out according to their metal content. Aluminum, barium, calcium, copper, iron, magnesium, manganese, potassium, sodium, strontium, zinc, and sulfur were determined by inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectrometry. The concentrations found for each element in the samples were used as chemical descriptors for characterization purposes. Principal component analysis, linear discriminant analysis and artificial neural networks were applied to differentiate types of tequila and mezcal. Using probabilistic neural networks 100% of success in the classification was obtained for silver, gold, extra-aged tequila and mezcal. In the case of aged tequila 90% of samples were successfully classified. Sodium, potassium, calcium, sulfur, magnesium, iron, strontium, copper and zinc were the most discriminant elements.

Ageing status characterization of Chinese rice wines using chemical descriptors combined with multivariate data analysis

“…However, in this study, rice wines from the three wineries employed similar raw materials and brewing water. Thus the differences between the wineries could be mainly attributed to the elaboration and ageing process (Ceballos-Magaña et al, 2009). Although no obvious increasing or decreasing trend was observed in the contents of elements, they might include a systematic difference due to ion-exchange, coupling and deposited in wines during ageing, which made multivariate analysis methods viable.…”

“…The parameters were selected based on their representativeness to rice wine's quality, flavour as well as its role in wine characterization (Ceballos-Magaña, Jurado, Martín, & Pablos, 2009;Niu et al, 2008;Yu, Ying, Fu, & Lu, 2006a). Six conventional parameters, as mentioned above, were determined using official methods according to Chinese National Standard GB 13662e2008.…”

Advances in assessing the elemental composition of distilled spirits using atomic spectrometry

“…The elemental compositions of distilled spirits vary depending on the raw materials used for their production, and the materials from which the equipment and the facilities used for production are made [14,26,27,39]. As can be seen from Tables 1 and 2, K, Na and Ca are present in the highest concentrations [2,5,[9][10][11][12]24,37,39].…”

“…As can be seen from Tables 1 and 2, K, Na and Ca are present in the highest concentrations [2,5,[9][10][11][12]24,37,39]. High content of these elements along with Li and Mg is often related to the quality of water used for dilution of distillates [2,3,9,10,16,33,39] and/or wooden barrels and casks used for aging distillates [2,9,24,39]. The presence of S in distilled spirits is probably due to the use of SO 2 at the stage of initial preparation of oak casks applied for the aging process [10,39].…”

Identification and quantification of furanic compounds in tequila and mezcal using spectroscopy and chemometric methods

“…[7][8][9][10][11][12][13] However, for some routine tests intended to keep or improve the quality control during fabrication, or to differentiate between two similar beverages as white tequilas and mezcals, still one has to make use of methods which are time consuming (with a time response of hours) or to make use of expensive equipment which might not be at hand. 14,15 In this paper we focus on an alternative screening method when a quick test is required. With this screening method we do not expect to certify the authenticity of spirits but helping to quantify some compounds through alternative ways, differentiate among similar beverages, or to screen the production on site for quality control.…”