burger buns

We can’t deny that it’s a politically charged summer here in North America. Are you finding that your summer social gatherings are heating up over divisive topics?

Of course, we’re talking about the texture of hamburger buns and potato salad. Everyone except possibly the family dog (he’ll eat anything) may have an opinion on what makes for the perfect versions of both. You may be surprised how irregularly shaped pieces of potato in store-bought potato salad can evoke opinions as strong as those for our current political candidates. Will this be the year that North Americans demand change and embrace the diversity of burger buns? We cannot say but we want to help keep the conversations civil with some independent fact checking. We fired up the TA.XTPlus Texture Analyzer to create two new application studies on hamburger buns and store-bought potato salad. We even updated the previous version of our hamburger bun application study by adding in comparisons of whole wheat and gluten-free buns.

TA.XTPlus Application Study: Hamburger Buns..comparing traditional to whole wheat and gluten-free

For this application study we tested six different hamburger buns from the following brands: Country Kitchen, Arnold, and Martin’s. We also included gluten-free (Schar’s) and whole wheat (Pepperidge Farms) samples so we could compare them to traditional white bread hamburger buns.

TA.XTPlus Application Study: Potato Salad

What makes for a great potato salad? Taste and flavor are obviously important elements but what else factors into a winning combination? A potato salad’s overall firmness is dependent on its potato chunks which vary in size and possibly many degrees of undercooking and overcooking. We tested an aggregate sample of potato salad with the TA-65 Multiple Puncture Probe, TA.XTPlus, and Exponent Software in this study because a bulk sample can average out much of the variability caused by the irregular pieces of potato. We tested the following brands for this study: Wellesley Farms, Whole Foods, and Market Basket.

Learn how the TA.XTPlus can help manufacturers come up with a candidate that appeals to the masses! Request these studies via our website or contact your regional manager to request a copy.

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