ROBUST SENSORY EVALUATION OF OLIVE OIL BY A NONPARAMETRIC SCORING SYSTEM

The quality grade of an olive oil is attributed on the basis of a numb er of chemical and physical parameters, and, in accordance with EC rul es, additionally by the sensory evaluation by a taste panel. Evaluatio n of the statistics of the method of the Conseil 0leicole Internationa l (COI) as reported by Albi and Gutierrez (J Sci Food Agric 54 (1991) 255-267) revealed a number of limitations and weaknesses. An alternati ve test has therefore been developed. Oils are first tasted by a small panel which decides on acceptance, rejection or further sensory evalu ation by a larger panel. The alternative conceptually simpler nonparam etric three-point scoring system developed removes some drawbacks of t he CSIC method. The method was applied to the panel results published by Albi and Gutierrez and the results of both methods were compared.