The food industry has endeavoured to move toward the direction of clean labelling. Therefore, replacing synthetic preservatives with natural plant extracts has gained significant importance. It is necessary to determine whether products enriched with such extracts are still accepted by consumers. In this study, consumer tests (n = 246) and sensory profiling were used to assess the impact of ethanol extracts of spices (lovage, marjoram, thyme, oregano, rosemary, and basil; concentration 0.05%) on the sensory quality of pork meatballs and hamburgers. The desirability of meat products with spice extracts to consumers depended on the added extract. The highest scores were for products with lovage extract, whose sensory profile was the most similar to the control sample without the addition of an extract (with higher intensity of broth taste compared with the others). Products with rosemary and thyme extracts were characterised by lower desirability than the control. This was related to the high intensity of spicy and essential oil tastes, as well as the bitter taste in the case of products with thyme. The studied extracts of spices allow for the creation of meat products (meatballs and hamburgers) with high consumer desirability, however, the high intensity of essential oil and spicy tastes might be a limitation.
Keywords: consumer research; ethanol extracts of spices; meat products; new product development; sensory profiling.