Volatile Amines in the Odors of Food

Abstract

SUMMARY To establish whether using steam distillation in the determination of volatile amines in food might lead to artifact formation, a number of nonvolatile nitrogenous substances known to occur in food were tested under these conditions. The results showed that such a formation need be considered only when relatively large amounts of phosphatides, caffeine, theobromine, or hordenine are present in the sample. A method was worked out to eliminate the artificial production of amines from phosphatides. Selected food items were tested for volatile amines following the suggested procedure, and most of the amines were tentatively identified by paper chromatography. In addition to amines, pyrrolidine was probably found in milk and cocoa powder.

General Introduction

“…utilized HS-GC in the winter of 1958-1959 to follow the development of rancidity in potato chips by analyzing an aliquot of the headspace gas taken with a gas-tight syringe directly from the bag of potato chips. The first published results on the use of (static) HS-GC for the investigation of fruits, honey, foods, and aqueous solutions of some organic compounds are from 1961-1962 [38][39][40][41][42][43][44][45].…”

Coffee, cocoa, and tea

“…Nevertheless, they certainly play a positive role in the flavors of wines, fruits, vegetables, and cereals. Few lower amines have been identified in coffee and tea volatiles but an important series of 42 aliphatic and aromatic amines have been found in cocoa aroma (114,120,131). Polyamines such asputrescine (P-46), cadaverine (P-47), spermidine (P-48), and spermine (P-49) have recently been identified in tea flavor (211).…”

“…After a long period of inactivity on the subject, the analytical work started again in 1958 with the investigations of Mohr (107), van Elzakker and Zutphen (113), Weurman and de Rooij (114), Bailey et al (115), Quesnel (116,117), Rizzi (118), and Carlin, Lee, Hsieh, Hwang, Ho, and Chang (119). Twenty-seven new compounds were identified in 1964 by Dietrich, Lederer,Winter,andStoll (120), and the analytical work of Flament, Willhalm, and Stoll (121) allowed the identification of 28 other constituents.…”

Flavoring Materials

“…Although many different enzymes develop from a precursor only certain ones produce the characteristic flavor (73,74). Thus a true raspberry flavor is produced in a deflavored raspberry puree only by enzymes obtained from raspberry fruit (76). A vegetable product contains several different enzymes in varying proportions that cause the formation of volatile components in ratios that may be different from the actual ratio of precursors present in that particular product.…”