DisplayTitle

Relationships of Selected Physical, Chemical, and Sensory Parameters in Oat Grain, Rolled Oats, and Cooked Oatmeal—A Three-Year Study with Eight Cultivars

¹University of Turku, Department of Biochemistry and Food Chemistry, FIN-20014 Turku, Finland. ²Corresponding author. Email: anja.lapvetelainen@uku.fi Fax: +358-17-163 903. Phone: +358-17-163 931. ³Melia Ltd., PO Box 101, FIN-21201 Raisio, Finland. ⁴University of Turku, Department of Statistics, FIN-20014 Turku, Finland.

Eight Scandinavian oat cultivars were studied as grains, groats before and after kiln drying, rolled oats, and oatmeal for 62 physical, chemical, and sensory parameters over three consecutive crop years. The objectives were to study cultivar and year differences, and the relationships between parameters to find out the cultivars most suitable for rolled oats production and to understand how grain parameters are reflected on groat, rolled oat, and oatmeal characteristics. The cultivars and crop years differed (P < 0.05) in most of the parameters. In addition, many groat, rolled oats, and oatmeal variables showed a significant year by crop interaction. Several grain variables were significantly interrelated but only two, moisture and amount of dark and damaged grains, had a strong correlation (r > 0.70) to rolled oat parameters, the former correlating negatively to crude fat and the latter positively with maximum viscosity value. However, some weaker (r < 0.70) negative associations were found such as those between kernel size value and β-glucan content and water binding capacity of rolled oats. In general, the variables analyzed at different processing stages correlated strongly, indicating good retention of groat properties during processing. Various associations were found between the physicochemical parameters of rolled oats and sensory properties of oatmeal. In principal component analysis, factor 1 mostly represented rolled oat parameters such as crude fat, color values L and a, and oatmeal parameters such as toasted aromatics, coarseness, and size of swollen particles. Factor 2 represented properties that pertain to structure and water and rolled oats interactions. The cultivars were also grouped according to these properties. The results suggest that the rolled oat process deserves optimization on a cultivar basis, particularly when specific product properties such as good water binding capacity are required.