Nutritional and sensory properties of salted fish product, lakerda

The objective of this study was to determine nutritional and sensorial properties of lakerda, a traditional salted fish product, produced from Atlantic bonito (Sarda sarda). From the point of nutritional characterization, chemical content and amino acid and fatty acid compositions of lakerda have been investigated. For determination of sensorial attribute, instrumental texture, instrumental color, and descriptive sensorial analyses were conducted. Chemical composition of lakerda was 52.22% water, 14.64% protein, 17.39% lipid, 15.14% ash. Protein of lakerda has a well-balanced amino acid composition, with high amounts of Glutamic acid + Glutamine (4.75 g/100 g), Aspartic acid + Asparagine (2.39 g/100 g), Leucine (1.51 g/100 g), and Valine (1.36 g/100 g). Thirty-two fatty acids were identified in lipid of lakerda, of which monounsaturated fatty acids were the highest proportion (40.91%). Oleic acid (C18:1) was dominant fatty acid followed by docosahexaenoic acid (DHA; 22:6n−3) and palmitic acid (C16:0) with percentages of 21.68, 18.79, 11.49, respectively. In instrumental properties, hardness, L* (lightness), a* (redness) and b* values (yellowness) of lakerda were measured as 2.04 kg, 37.44, 5.23, and 0.47, respectively. The results of this study indicated that lakerda has outstanding sensory and nutritional characteristics due to high quality and well-balanced essential amino acid and fatty acid.