🍎 Bread — organoleptic evaluation and physicochemical tests, PN-A-74108

Food chemistry PN-A-74108

Overview

WHAT THIS STANDARD DESCRIBES. The scope from the PKN catalogue card, in full: "Podano ogólne warunki przeprowadzania badań organoleptycznych oraz metody oceny wyglądu zewnętrznego skórki, miękiszu, smaku i zapachu pieczywa. Omówiono badania fizykochemiczne pieczywa obejmujące metody oznaczania objętości, wilgotności, kwasowości, zawartości soli, tłuszczu i cukrów. Do oznaczania wilgotności, kwasowości i zawartości tłuszczu zaproponowano do stosowania w zależności od potrzeb metody odwoławcze i szybsze metody techniczne do oznaczań seryjnych; do oznaczania cukrów - dwie metody równorzędne: Lane-Eynona zmodyfikowaną przez Wyczańskiego i Luffa-Schoorla. Zamieszczono tablicę oceny i sposób punktowego wartościowania poszczególnych wskaźników jakości pieczywa oraz tablicę poziomów jakości, uzależnionych od sumy uzyskanych przez pieczywo punktów. W załącznikach podano sposób mianowania płynów Fehlinga stosowanych w metodzie Lane-Eynona i tablice do wyliczeń zawartości cukrów, oznaczonej dwoma wymienionymi metodami" [General conditions for carrying out organoleptic tests and methods for assessing the external appearance, crust, crumb, taste and smell of bread are given. Physicochemical tests of bread are discussed, comprising methods for determining volume, moisture, acidity and salt, fat and sugar content. For the determination of moisture, acidity and fat content, reference methods and faster technical methods for routine determinations are proposed for use as required; for the determination of sugars — two equivalent methods: the Lane-Eynon method as modified by Wyczański and the Luff-Schoorl method. An assessment table and the method of scoring the individual quality parameters of bread are included, as well as a table of quality levels depending on the total number of points obtained by the bread. The annexes give the method of standardising the Fehling's solutions used in the Lane-Eynon method and tables for calculating the sugar content determined by the two methods mentioned].

STATUS (state of the card on 23.09.2026). The card has the header "Withdrawn" and the row "Withdrawal date: 31-10-2023". The card has no "Replaced by" field — the catalogue indicates no successor. The standard replaced the earlier edition PN-A-74108:1989. Whether another document in force stands in the PKN catalogue today for the individual bread tests — WE HAVE NOT FULLY ESTABLISHED: the catalogue search for the word "pieczywo" [bread] (reading of 23.09.2026) gives 59 results, and only two items among them have no withdrawal note — the product standard PN-A-74112:1997 "Pieczywo trwałe żytnie, mieszane, pszenne" [long-life rye, mixed and wheat bread] and the packaging standard PN-O-79835-11:1997; all the standards for test methods for bread on this list have been withdrawn. Documents that do not have the word "pieczywo" in their title are not covered by this search.

ONE NUMBER, SEVERAL DIFFERENT TESTS — THAT IS WHY THE SCOPES GIVE THE CLAUSE. A standard cited without a clause does not say which test was performed. In the accreditation scopes 20 of the 32 entries indicate a clause of the standard, and the test names at the clauses are distributed as follows (reading of 23.09.2026; laboratories / entries): • clause 2 — organoleptic evaluation, descriptive method: 4 / 4 (AB 076, AB 518, AB 520, AB 521); • clause 3.3.2 — moisture or water content, gravimetric method: 3 / 3 (AB 518, AB 521, AB 583); • clause 3.4 — acidity, titrimetric method: 3 / 3 (AB 521, AB 560, AB 583); • clause 3.4.4 — acidity, titrimetric method: 2 / 2 (AB 381, AB 518); • clause 3.5 — salt or chloride content expressed as NaCl, titrimetric method: 2 / 2 (AB 510 — "Metoda miareczkowa (Mohra)" [titrimetric method (Mohr)], AB 583); • clause 3.6 — fat content, gravimetric method: 2 / 2 (AB 510, AB 583); • clauses 3.7.1 and 3.7.2 — total sugar content, titrimetric method: 1 / 1 (AB 444); • clause 3.7.3 — sugar content, titrimetric method: 1 / 1 (AB 583); • clause 4 — scoring, "Poziom jakości" [quality level]: 2 / 2 (AB 381, AB 518); • without a clause — 6 laboratories / 12 entries: AB 1179 (water, reducing sugars and total sugars after inversion — "Metoda miareczkowa (Luffa-Schoorla)" [titrimetric method (Luff-Schoorl)], sodium chloride — "Metoda miareczkowa (Mohra)"; 5 entries), AB 1334 (organoleptic evaluation and acidity by potentiometric titration), AB 313 (total sugars, also "z obliczeń" [calculated]), AB 1095 (total acidity), AB 1138 and AB 532 (organoleptic evaluation). Which methods of the standard are hidden under clauses 3.7.1, 3.7.2 and 3.7.3 — WE HAVE NOT ESTABLISHED: the card speaks of two equivalent methods for determining sugars, and we did not have the text of the standard.

HOW MANY LABORATORIES AND IN WHAT FORM. All notations of the number 74108 in the reference-document field (no digit may stand before or after the number): 32 entries at 15 laboratories. The "Laboratories" tab, which searches for notations BEGINNING with "PN-A-74108", shows exactly the same — every notation begins with "PN-A-74108". The notations differ by the added clause, and apart from that there are three single ones: without the year ("PN-A-74108", AB 1179), with a space after the colon ("PN-A-74108: 1996", AB 583) and with a letter after the year ("PN-A-74108:1996 Ł", AB 1095).

NOT ONLY BREAD. The card speaks of bread, while laboratories also cite this standard for other objects of testing: cereals and cereal products (AB 1095, AB 583, AB 1179), seeds of leguminous plants (AB 1179), flour and breadcrumbs (AB 560, AB 521), sweets and confectionery (AB 510), bakery semi-finished products and sweet bakery products (AB 313, AB 381), long-life bread (AB 076). Whether the standard provides for such uses — WE HAVE NOT ESTABLISHED; this is a reading of the scopes, not of the content of the standard.

WHAT WE DO NOT GIVE. We did not have the text of the standard — PKN makes it available for a fee (18 pages). We do not give the course of any determination, the drying conditions, the concentrations of solutions, the formulas, the scoring table or the thresholds of the quality levels.

Method principle

According to the card of the standard: the tests of bread are divided into organoleptic tests (card: "metody oceny wyglądu zewnętrznego skórki, miękiszu, smaku i zapachu pieczywa" [methods for assessing the external appearance, crust, crumb, taste and smell of bread], under the general conditions given in the standard) and physicochemical tests (volume, moisture, acidity, salt, fat and sugar content). For moisture, acidity and fat the standard proposes reference methods and faster technical methods for routine determinations, for sugars — two equivalent methods: the Lane-Eynon method as modified by Wyczański and the Luff-Schoorl method. The quality parameters are scored according to the assessment table, and the total score determines the quality level. In the accreditation scopes the methods standing next to this standard are gravimetric (moisture, fat), titrimetric (acidity, salt, sugars), potentiometric titration (acidity, one laboratory) and descriptive and scoring methods (organoleptic evaluation). WE DO NOT GIVE the course of the determinations — we did not have the text of the standard.

Applications

• Organoleptic evaluation of bread — descriptive (clause 2) and by scoring with a quality level (clause 4), according to the accreditation scopes
• Moisture (water content) of bread — gravimetric method
• Acidity of bread — titrimetric method, at one laboratory potentiometric titration
• Salt (sodium chloride) content — titrimetric method, at two laboratories with the addition "Mohra" [Mohr]
• Fat content — gravimetric method
• Content of reducing and total sugars — titrimetric method, at one laboratory "Luffa-Schoorla" [Luff-Schoorl]
• In the accreditation scopes also cereals and cereal products, flour, breadcrumbs, seeds of leguminous plants and confectionery

Key parameters

Standard

Standard number

PN-A-74108:1996 (wersja polska)

Title (PL)

Pieczywo — Metody badań

Title (EN)

Bread — Test methods

Step-by-step procedure

1. Status of the document

   PKN card: the standard was withdrawn on 31-10-2023, with no "Replaced by" field (state of the card on 23.09.2026).

2. Indicating the test and the clause of the standard

   Several tests stand under one number. In the accreditation scopes 20 of the 32 entries give a clause of the standard (2, 3.3.2, 3.4, 3.4.4, 3.5, 3.6, 3.7.1, 3.7.2, 3.7.3, 4); the other 12 cite the standard as a whole next to the name of the test.

3. Determination

   WE DO NOT GIVE the course, the conditions or the formulas — we did not have the text of the standard. The card says only that for moisture, acidity and fat the standard proposes reference methods and faster technical methods, and for sugars two equivalent methods.

4. Scoring and quality level

   Card: the standard contains an assessment table and the method of scoring the quality parameters, as well as a table of quality levels depending on the total score. WE DO NOT GIVE the point values or the thresholds.

Required equipment and apparatus

Reagents, media and consumables

Health and safety (OHS)

• We do not describe the hazards associated with the reagents — we do not know their list, because we did not have the text of the standard; the safety data sheets of the reagents used in the laboratory apply

Frequently asked questions