Alternative diets maintain gilthead seabream acceptance in consumer trial

Diversifying feed ingredients can be compatible with maintaining favourable consumer rating for gilthead seabream. This is the finding of a study published in Foods, comparing a reference diet containing fishmeal, a formulation with processed animal proteins – including poultry meal – and a third containing insect meal and microbial biomass.

The research, conducted by scientists at Miguel Hernández University and the Institute of Aquaculture Torre de la Sal (IATS-CSIC), addresses a relevant question for fish farmers and feed manufacturers: whether changes in feed translate into characteristics of the final product that could influence its acceptance.

The researchers rared gilthead seabream from around 15 grams between May 2022 and September 2023, using two tanks per diet, and assessed fish weighing approximately 300 and 800 grams.

They found no significant differences in cooking loss or most instrumental texture measurements. However, the alternative formulations produced some changes: a panel of ten trained assessors detected, among other differences, greater firmless in 800-gram fish fed the diet containing insect meal and microbial biomass.

In the trial involving 81 regular fish consumers, conducted with 800-gram seabream, mean liking scores for all assessed attributes exceeding the neutral midpoint of the scale.

No significant differences between diets were found in consumer raiting for appearance or odour. The processed animal protein formulation received higher liking scores than the control for oily flavour and aftertaste, and outperformed both other diets in ratings for oilness in the mouth.

These results indicate that the sensory differences detected did not translate into a general decline in consumer ratings for the alternative formulaions.

The findings provide further evidence of the importance of assessing product quality alongside production performance before introducing a new formulation at commercial scale.

Reference:

Rodríguez-Soriano, M., Noguera-Artiaga, L., Calduch-Giner, J. Á., Hernández, F., Carbonell-Barrachina, Á. A., Solivella-Poveda, A. M., Belenguer, Á., Pérez-Sánchez, J., & Sendra, E. (2026). Evaluating the Sensory Profile and Quality Traits of Sparus aurata Fed Sustainable Diets. Foods, 15(20), 3590. https://doi.org/10.3390/foods15203590