438 EXPERIMENT STATION RECORD. 



etlici-cal salts, tli" titiatioii nl" tlii' excess of iiiiiu-ral aciil ami all<i\vin<r for tlu- snl)trac- 

 tion of tliL' volatile from tlie total acids. 



The associate referee indorsed a reeoiiiiuendatioii of II. V.. Sawyer that in the 

 determination of aci<lity a (•han<:e be made from sodinm hydrate to barium hydrate 

 for titration. He suggested that a i'omi)arative study be made of other methods of 

 fusel oil deternii nation. References to recent information concerning distilled li(|uors 

 were given in the repfirt. 



Report of associate referee on flavoring extracts, .\. L. Winton. — Tlie methods 

 outlined by the previous associate referee were considered as needing only slight 

 changes. It was l)elieved that in the near future certain new lines of work must be 

 taken uj), and special mention was made in this connection of lemon extracts and 

 the artificial fruit ethers. The matter of lemon extracts was brought to the attention 

 of the associate referee by the work of the Dairy and Food Department of Michigan. 

 It was found in that State that an extract was being manufactured by treating lemon 

 oil with dilute alcohol, which process removed the citral, but did not dissolve out any 

 appreciable quantity of the oil. A second extract could then be made with the oil. 



It was the opinion of the associate referee that the citral is not the only valuable 

 ingredient of a lemon extract, but that the terpenes have a decided value. It was 

 considered highly desirable that methods be devised for recognizing these two extracts, 

 one designated the washed-out extract and containing oidy the citral and the other 

 the extract made with the washed-out oil and containing only the terpenes. 



By request of the associate referee the State analyst of ^Michigan. R. E. Doolittle, 

 explained more in detail t"lie legal features of the work mentioned. While the United 

 States Pharmacopieia was accepted by the Supreme Court of Michigan as the standard 

 in the preparation of lemon extracts, it was also held by the court that there was no 

 violation of the statute in eliminating such ingredients as could be dispensed with 

 without injury to the product as a food product. The manufacturers of washed-out 

 extracts claimed a positive advantage in the total exclusion of the terpenes from the 

 extract. In the test case a new trial was ordered, but as the defendant pleaded guilty 

 no legal decision was reached as to the status of terpene-free lemon extract. Owing, 

 therefore, to this decision and the absence of methods for determining citral, nothing 

 further is being done in the State on the lemon-extract cjuestibn. 



Report of associate referee on spices, R. E. Doolittle. — The associate referee 

 received no collaboration by members of the association during the year. Analyses 

 were made by him of samples of pure pepper, the methods employed being those 

 adopted provisionally by the association, and his comments were based upon this 

 work. In the determination of starch by the diastase method the use of a pancreatic 

 diastase was adopted in place of powdered malt. Inasmuch as the animal diastase 

 gave no reduction on Fehling solution, one source of error was thereby eliminated. 

 It was suggested that the use of this diastase be a subject for investigation by the 

 associate referee on si)ices for the coming year. In the determination of the amount 

 of copper reduced, the associate referee preferred weighing as cuprous oxid, as 

 described by Munson last year. It was recommended that the various kinds of 

 filters and containers suggested in the provisional method for the determination of 

 crude fiber be thoroughly studied. 



Report of associate referee on oils and fats, L. M. Tolman. — In work upon 

 iodin absorption the Hiibl method, the official method of the association, was com- 

 pared with the Hanus and Wijs methods in collaboration with a number of analysts. 

 The 3 methods did not give very concordant results on oils with high iodin numbers. 

 On 51 samples of butter and 14 of oleomargarine examined by G. E. Patrick, the 

 Hanus method invariably gave slightly higher results, the average differences being 

 1.01 and 1.14, respectively, in the 2 series. Eleven samples of pure olive oil were 

 examined by 3 analysts, the average differences in the determinations being 1.8 by 



