Physicochemical Exploration of Cocoa Butter During Spontaneous Fermentation: A Comparative Study Across Three Latin American Countries

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Comments on the work "Physicochemical exploration of cocoa butter during spontaneous fermentation: a comparative study across three Latin American countries". The manuscript is well written, and the data are well presented. However, it would have been interesting if all cocoa varieties were fermented for the same amount of time and following the same fermentation method to determine the inherent properties of each cocoa variety. However, the physical and chemical results on cocoa butter composition are relevant to cocoa processing and the future production of high-quality chocolate. The references presented are important, and most of them have been published recently. There are a few minor errors that could be revised:

Line 73: The scientific name should be in italics.

Lines 406-409: The fermentation time for cocoa from Mexico was the same as that for cocoa from Peru, and cocoa from Brazil had the shortest fermentation time. The sentence in lines 407-409 is a bit confusing, as it appears that cocoa from Mexico had the shortest fermentation time.

Line 460: It should be written Table 2 and not Table 1, and the name should also be different, at least more specific to the table's contents.

Author Response

Comments on the work "Physicochemical exploration of cocoa butter during spontaneous fermentation: a comparative study across three Latin American countries". The manuscript is well written, and the data are well presented. However, it would have been interesting if all cocoa varieties were fermented for the same amount of time and following the same fermentation method to determine the inherent properties of each cocoa variety. However, the physical and chemical results on cocoa butter composition are relevant to cocoa processing and the future production of high-quality chocolate. The references presented are important, and most of them have been published recently. There are a few minor errors that could be revised:

Response: Thank you for the comment. We will consider your suggestion for our future researches.

• Line 73: The scientific name should be in italics.

Response: Thank you, we changed to italics [L. 73]

 

• Lines 406-409: The fermentation time for cocoa from Mexico was the same as that for cocoa from Peru, and cocoa from Brazil had the shortest fermentation time. The sentence in lines 407-409 is a bit confusing, as it appears that cocoa from Mexico had the shortest fermentation time.

Response: We clarified the sentence [L. 406-408]

 

• Line 460: It should be written Table 2 and not Table 1, and the name should also be different, at least more specific to the table's contents.

Response: Thank you for your comments. We corrected the numbering in Table 2 and the name [L. 459]

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

GENERAL COMMENTS The manuscript describes an interesting analysis of the Physicochemical exploration of cocoa butter during spontaneous fermentation. The authors conclude that the fermentation process has an impact on the product and could be optimized to develop high-quality chocolate products. The abstract describes the accuracy of the article's proposal.   The introduction is accurate and effectively describes the influence of the fermentation process. It is recommended to edit in:   Line 73 edit in italics “Theobroma cacao” Line 114 “the fermentation process,” could be considered as part of the methodology instead of the introduction   Methodology is well described and supported in several references   From results It is recommended to edit Figure 1 or replace it with a table that includes the percentage of FAME and traces only mentioned in the text body, and, if possible, include an ANOVA to observe significant differences between different regions.   The results and discussion clarify the impact of the fermentation process in each country on cocoa butter, referencing sources to support these findings.   For the conclusion, it is recommended to clearly express the scientific contribution of the work, avoiding a detailed discussion of the results.

Author Response

The manuscript describes an interesting analysis of the Physicochemical exploration of cocoa butter during spontaneous fermentation. The authors conclude that the fermentation process has an impact on the product and could be optimized to develop high-quality chocolate products. The abstract describes the accuracy of the article's proposal.   The introduction is accurate and effectively describes the influence of the fermentation process. It is recommended to edit in:

Response: Thank you for the comment.

• Line 73 edit in italics “Theobroma cacao”

Response: Thank you, we changed to italics [L. 73]

 

• Line 114 “the fermentation process,” could be considered as part of the methodology instead of the introduction

Response: We changed the location of the sentence to methodology [L. 126-127]

 

• Methodology is well described and supported in several references

Response: Thank for you comment.

 

• From results It is recommended to edit Figure 1 or replace it with a table that includes the percentage of FAME and traces only mentioned in the text body, and, if possible, include an ANOVA to observe significant differences between different regions.

Response: We edited Figure 1. by adding more information (percentage) on it. We did not include ANOVA because we only one took one measure [L. 312-314]

 

• The results and discussion clarify the impact of the fermentation process in each country on cocoa butter, referencing sources to support these findings.

Response: Thank for you comment.

 

• For the conclusion, it is recommended to clearly express the scientific contribution of the work, avoiding a detailed discussion of the results.

Response: Thank for the suggestion, we improved the conclusion [L. 646-647, 650-653, 654-661, 662-666, 669-676]

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf