An essential compound imparting the sweet taste to beef broth was investigated. Taste activity-guided fractionation of beef broth by ultrafiltration, gel permeation chromatography, and HPLC in combination with the recently developed comparative taste dilution analysis enabled the localization of a fraction possessing sweetness-enhancing activity upon degustation. Comparison of the chromatographic, spectroscopic, and sensory data with those of the synthetic reference compound led to the identification of the sweetness-enhancing N-(1-carboxyethyl)-6-(hydroxymethyl)pyridinium-3-ol inner salt, named alapyridaine, which was recently isolated from heated aqueous solutions of hexoses and l-alanine. After quantification of alapyridaine in beef broth, sensory analysis of synthetic beef taste recombinates spiked with synthetic alapyridaine in its {\dq}natural{\dq} concentration of 419 mug/L and comparison to the taste quality of a tastant recombinate lacking the alapyridaine revealed a significant increase in sweetness and umami character only when the alapyridaine was present in the recombinate. These data demonstrate for the first time that, in {\dq}natural{\dq} concentrations, the alapyridaine exhibited a pronounced effect on the overall taste quality of beef broth, in particular, on the sweet and umami character.     «

An essential compound imparting the sweet taste to beef broth was investigated. Taste activity-guided fractionation of beef broth by ultrafiltration, gel permeation chromatography, and HPLC in combination with the recently developed comparative taste dilution analysis enabled the localization of a fraction possessing sweetness-enhancing activity upon degustation. Comparison of the chromatographic, spectroscopic, and sensory data with those of the synthetic reference compound led to the identific...     »