Mealiness in apples: Towards a multilingual consumer vocabulary

Three commercial varieties of dessert apples known to be susceptible to varying degrees of mealiness were evaluated by descriptive sensory profiling. In parallel, consumer testing using the repertory grid technique was conducted with consumers representing 5 different European countries. Generalized Procrustes Analysis of the repertory grid data suggested a cross-cultural consensus with respect to consumer perception of mealiness. In particular, mealiness was associated with the texture of Cox apples. Curved box-plots, an innovative extension of ordinary box-plots, was used to explore the consumers' use of descriptive attributes. This indicated that although consumers perceived mealiness similarly, they described their perceptions differently.