Assessment of sensory and physical-chemical quality, and potential for certification of cachacas from the state of Paraiba, Brazil

The State of Paraiba is an important producer of artisanal cachaca that has outstanding quality in national tasting panels and for this reason this research studied organizational aspects for certification and compliance with Good Manufacturing Practices GMP of 53% of formal producers. Samples of cachacas from these producers were evaluated for physical-chemical and sensory quality by experienced tasters. Sixty-five percent of the cachacas evaluated met the legally determined physical chemical quality parameters, but only 35% met the certification parameters. Evaluated the cachaca factories, on average, 85% of the GMP criteria were met. While, meeting the organizational criteria established for certification ranged from 48.1 to 82.4%. The sensory evaluation of the cachaca samples indicated that the distillates from Paraiba should be subjected to longer storage times in wooden barrels, as they had a high alcoholic olfactory character, aroma related to solvent, burning and pungency and did not present intense oiliness, vanilla flavor and caramel. The results indicated that cachaca producers in Paraiba will have difficulties in obtaining the certification seal, since they only respected 66.4% of the organizational aspects of registration and mandatory control.

Automated summary

This research studied the organizational aspects and compliance with Good Manufacturing Practices of 53% of formal cachaca producers in Paraiba, showing that most samples met the legal quality parameters but struggled to meet certification parameters. The sensory evaluation suggested that the distillates could benefit from longer storage in wooden barrels. Overall, the results indicated that obtaining certification seals may be challenging for cachaca producers in Paraiba due to issues with organizational aspects.