Análisis web

With the developed meatballs, the most important aspects of the product were the sensory characteristics and the reaction of the consumers to the product. Because the development of the product was carried out mainly in New Zealand, general Thai consumer perceptions of and reaction to the product were not known. Information was also required on packaging, outlets for sale, product usage, buying, promotion, etc.

Sophisticated test marketing techniques such as laboratory test markets, controlled store tests and standard test markets were not appropriate in the final stage of this research. This was mainly because only the 'prototype' product was developed and it should be firstly consumer tested prior to being subjected to a test marketing. In addition, test marketing requ ires exte nsive planning and is normally organised by marketing professionals in consumer companies. Ordinary test marketing techniques also demand a large su m of money. All these criteria restricted performing the test marketing but rather led to the choosing of a consumer test as a valid technique for testing the developed meatballs.

The home use test was selected as a final consumer testing technique in this project. This was due to the reasons that:

* the developed product was aimed for a test under a natural home use condition . * ' it provided a possibility to choose the economic levels of the target respondents. * it gave a better attainment of more questions and information related to the product

being tested.

* there was only one product sample to be tested. Therefore, the time and b udget

required to complete the test was not the major concern.

9.3 METHODS

9.3.1 The Production Trial

9.3. 1 . 1 Raw Materials and

The frozen boneless mutton legs used in the production trial were obtained from Waitaki International limited, Feilding, New Zealand. The meat was delivered to Bangkok by sea. This took approximately one month. The meat was then stored in a freezer (-1 8 0c) at the Department of Food Technology, Chulalongkorn University for ca. 2 months before use . Boneless pork legs and pork backfat were purchased from a fresh market, the time after slaughtering being within 4 hours.

Other ingredients used in the production trial were the same as those used for making the meatballs tested in the previous focus groups.

9.3. 1 .2 of Raw Materials

The frozen boneless mutton legs were tempered in a chill room (4 QC) for 48 hours. The tempered boneless mutton legs, boneless pork legs and pork backfat were trimmed to remove, as much as possible, visible fat and/or connective tissue at the Department of Food Technology, Chulalongkorn University. The trimmed meats and fat were then cut into cubes of ca. 2.5 cm. The cut meats and fat were stored in a chill room for 1 8 hours before u se in the production trial at the Department of Livestock Development, Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives, Bangkok.

9.3. 1 .3 of Meatballs

The production trial was divided into three batches, each 1 5 kg of meats and fat, due to the capacity of the chopper. The prototype formulation, obtained from the results of the focus groups (refer to Chapter 8) , was used.

The cut meats and fat were separately ground through a Strommen meat grinder fitted with a 2 mm pe rfo rated plate. The g round meats and fat were then chopped wit h a l l dry ingredients and ice using a Muller Food Processing bowl chopper assembled with six high capacity knives. The mix was firstly chopped for 2 minutes. The machine was then stopped and tbe mix was manually scraped, from the lid and the rim of the bowl, with a plastic b lade. To finish the chopping step, the mix was then chopped for an additional 1 minute u ntil a paste like material was obtained. The final temperature of the mix after chopping was 1 6QC.

The chopped mix was then removed from the bowl chopper and manually formed into balls by a few skilled officials at the Department and the balls were immediately dropped i nto a rectangular cooker filled with hot wate r at 65-70 QC. The balls were cooked until they floated (8-9 minutes) and then recooked in another cooker at 80-85 QC until they refloated ( 1 -2 minutes) . The balls were then coo led in water at 25 QC until they ref loat e d ( 1 -2 minutes) , and strained to remove water.

The prepared meatballs were then dipped into mixed egg white and yolk and rolled in bread crumbs. Twelve crumbed meatballs were separately packed into each polyethylen e bag. There were 200 bags of meatballs ready for the distribution for the home use test next day. Approximately 1 .5 kg of the crumbed meatballs were packed into a polyethylene bag for a proximate analysis. This was delivered to the Department of Science Services, Ministry of Science, Technology and Energy on the following day. All the p repared m eatballs were immediately delivered to the Department of Food Technology, Chulalongkom Univers ity and stored in a chill room (4 QC) before being used for the home use testing, and the proximate analysis.

9.3.2 Consumer

Consumer testing of the developed meatballs was done by a home-use test in the Bangkok area.

9.3.2.1 The

There was only one sample given to each household. No attempt was made to compare the developed product with local meatballs. This was due to the reasons that the developed p roduct was different fro m t h e commercial p roducts available in the markets. The developed product was made fro m a new type of meat. was spicy. and was crumbed so it should not be compared directly to local meatballs. In addition. testing of one sample was suitable for a very large number of respondents since less time and a smaller budget was required for organising it. It was also su itable for gene ral consu mers who w e re not experienced in judging or do ing sensory evaluation of food products. These con s umers would feel at ease when required to assess several sensory attributes of only one p ro duct. Therefore. the chance of non-responses could be minimised.

The packages were not coded or labelled. There were 1 2 meatballs in each clear polythene bag and it was expected that 4 members in each household would have enough meatballs to te�t.

9 .3.2.2 The

An atte mpt was made to give the sampl e of the meatballs to t h e prespecified t arget consumers. middle or upper class profeSSional and business families. Random selection of the respondents cou ld not be done because getting accessibility to local households in specific districts of the Bangkok area was extremely difficult.

The samples were given to two hundred households including 50 families of teachers in two different public schools (25 each). 25 families of office workers in the Thai Military B ank. 3 0 families of government officials in the Food and Drug Administration Department. Ministry of Public Health, 1 5 families of university staff in Chulalongkorn University Library, and 80 families of teachers and pupils in Chulalongkorn Demonstration School.

There were two groups of respondents who completed the qu estio nnaires. One group of respondents was required to assess the product's characteristics. One member belonging to each specified age group was required to do the sensory evaluation. The age g roups were classified into (1) children ( 1 0-1 2 years); (2) teenagers ( 1 3-1 9 years) ; (3) adu lts (20- 40 years) ; and (4) the older people (>40 years). The age for children was specified "not

under 1 0 years" since it was expected that young children might not follow the instructions, might be reluctant in testing the product and had difficulty in filling the questionnaire s and thus, t he re might be a possibil ity of obtaining u nreliable result s . A nother g roup of respondents comprised the housewives. One housewive in each household was asked to answer the supplementary questionnaire.

9.3.2.3 The Questionnaires

A separate page was addressed to the leaders of the families. It contained information about the purposes of the consumer testing; how to prepare the meatballs for consumption ; how t h e members o f the families were requ ired to fill i n the question naires; the given time span to finish the test; how to store the sample if not tested immediately after receiving it ;

and finally, words of gratefu lness. Two types o f qu estio nnaires accompa n i ed t h is introductory page and the sample of the meatballs to each household.

The first type of qu estionnaire was for evaluat ing the liking/disliking perception of the co nsumers to the se nsory characteristics of the developed product, name ly l i k i ng of appearance, liking of aroma, liking of texture, liking of flavour and overall liking . A 7-point hedonic scale rating was used. The scale was classified into dislike very much, d islike moderately, dislike slightly, neither like nor dislike, like slightly, like moderately, and like very much. In the questionnaire, explanation of the sensory terms was provided so t h at all respondents knew the sensory characteristics they were assessing and they perceived all these attributes in the same manner. Sex, age, and career were also asked to attain some background of each respondent (see Appendix 9.1 ). The colour of this questionnaire was white.

A second type of qu estionnaire was also provided, but only to a housewife, for each household. Information related to buying, marketing and usage of the developed product was sought. Details of this questionnaire are given in Appendix 9.2. The colo u r of this supplementary questionnaire was pink. All questionnaires were in Thai.

9.3.2.4 of the Test

Two hundred bags of the meatballs were firstly given to six coordinators who were willing to help. These six people then distributed the meatball samples, from the centres where they work, to the respective families as mentioned previously. The distribution was made to these families who belonged to the target markets of the middle and upper classes. Every household received, together with a bag of meatballs, a set of questionnaires consisting of an introductory page; four copies of the sensory evaluation form, i.e. one for a member belonging to each age group (if any) ; and one questionnaire for a housewife.

The home use test started on November 9 , 1 987. When testing of the product was f i nished within two weeks, the six coordinators helped collect the questionnaires and returned them to the author. This method of distributing and collecting the samples and the questio nnaires was expected to give a high percentage of returned responses.

9.3.2.5 of the Data

Hedonic ratings for s e nsory characteristics of the d eveloped meatballs give n by all respondents were converted into numerical scores by assigning 1 = dislike very much and 7 = like very much. These scores were then analysed for means and frequencies by the

M IN I TAB statistical package ( Ryan et al. , 1 976) . Correlation and regression were also analysed by the MINITAB.

Other information related to the developed meatballs were summarised and prese nted, if applicable, in percentages.