Development of Seed-Oil Based Dried Sausages, Considering Physicochemical and Nutritional Quality and the Role of Food Neophobia

Abstract

A growing number of consumers now consider the consumption of processed meat products to be an essentially unhealthy habit. Hence, the reformulation of meat products is crucial. In this regard, the aim of this study is to reformulate “fuet”, a traditional Spanish dried sausage, by replacing the pork fat with emulsified seed oils (50–50%, 25–75% and 0–100%). Four seed oils were evaluated, including commercial seeds (poppy and chia) and other seeds considered subproducts (melon and pumpkin). Physical parameters, nutritional quality and consumer evaluation of the reformulated dried sausages were analyzed. Additionally, we considered the effects of food neophobia on consumer evaluation. The resulting fuets had a higher concentration of linoleic and linolenic acids, which varied according to the oil used. In the sensory analysis, non-neophobic consumers showed higher preference for the reformulated fuets, while all consumers gave their highest ratings to the fuets produced with pumpkin seed oil.