Consumer acceptability and quality characteristics of sweet onions and novel highbush blueberry cultivars

Southern highbush blueberries and sweet onions were evaluated by both descriptive and affective sensory panels to assess their quality characteristics and how they relate to acceptability by consumers. Two types of blueberries were evaluatedcrisp flesh and non-crisp flesh berries. The novel crisp flesh berry genotypes were found to be acceptable to consumers and firmer, crisper, and sweeter than the non-crisp berries by the descriptive panel. The sweet onions were evaluated mainly for their sweetness and pungency by the descriptive panel. Mathematical models developed revealed that sweetness drives superior sweet onion eating quality, while increases in pungency resulted in onions with less acceptable eating quality. The experienced panel responses correlated moderately well with analytical measures of pungent onion volatiles.