Consumer Research on Innovative Jams Containing Ingredients with Potential Health Benefits

• Autor(a) principal: Guiné, Raquel
• Data de Publicação: 2018
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: http://hdl.handle.net/10400.19/5032
• topic: Jam; Health; Product development

Consumers are now more aware of the interconnection between the concepts of enjoyable foods and foods with beneficial health properties, so that the market of foods more linked to health promotion has greatly expanded. In this work, the possible acceptance of the consumers towards innovative jams with the inclusion of functional ingredients was evaluated. For that, a questionnaire study was carried out on a sample of 400 participants during the period from November to December 2016. The questionnaires were applied in the central region of Portugal by direct interview after verbal informed consent and only to participants aged 18 years or over. The results obtained showed that 80% of the participants enjoy jams, 76% of them produce them at home and only 24% usually buy them. Most participants consume functional products (74%), and appreciate differently the various possible ingredients added in the jams, recognizing as particularly important the raspberry, strawberry, orange, pear, mango and honey, also recognizing as important the seeds (chia, poppy, sesame). Regarding the introduction of the ingredients in jams, those that caused more strangeness, due to their originality in this type of food, were acerola, goji berries or seeds. In conclusion, the study showed that selling jams with functional ingredients may be a good strategy, but it is important to carry out sensory tests to verify the acceptance of the products towards the type of ingredients used.