Objective and subjective evaluation of flavor caused by filter for drink extraction

Filters for drink extraction are made of natural, plastic fibers or combinations of the fibers. However, we often feel unfavorable flavors of extraction solutions caused by terpenes included in raw materials and residual chemical substances in production processes and so on. Our final goal is to develop a filter for drink extraction without unfavorable flavors felt by human. In this study, we demonstrate that a fabricated polyethylene terephthalate (PET) non-woven fabric not containing plant-derived fibers and chemical reagents such as adhesives and dispersant is suitable as a filter for drink extraction using a taste sensor and GC-MS as objective evaluations and a sensory evaluation and GC-olfactometry as subjective evaluation. The taste sensor detected bitterness as well as sensory evaluation, which indicated that it was a good evaluation method in the evaluation of the taste of the beverage filter. In addition, it found that the heat-sealing paper had a more bitter taste than the PET non-woven fabric. In GC-MS and odor sniffing GC, PET non-woven fabric does not contain non-2-enal, which is a factor of cardboard flavor, and can be a useful beverage filter. Thus, the results obtained in this paper suggest that the fabricated PET non-woven fabric will be a great material, which does not impart a different flavor to the beverage.