The sweet taste plays an important role in overall liking and enjoyment of food. The present study aimed to investigate the impact of spice addition on consumers‘ colour perception, smell and sweetness. The gradually sweetened rice (1 %, 3 % and 5 % of sugar added), as the main ingredient was supplemented with hot pepper, chilli pepper and wasabi paste. The experimentally formed samples were sensory analysed by the panellists. The colour was the most affected sensory property, with more expressive differences in samples containing both pepper spices than the wasabi. The highest colour intensity change was recorded in a sample group containing 1 % added sugar and spiced with hot pepper (control sample: 0.18; spice concentration of 0.8 %: 6.84). Addition of vinegar had a noticeable effect on smell and sweetness of samples in which it was added. In the samples with no vinegar added, wasabi contained samples had notably the highest impact on smell and sweetness of the samples. Consumers’ perceptions of smell changed from 1.86 for control to 6.87 for 2.5 % wasabi paste concentration; the sweetness increased from 3.56 for control to 6.04 for the same wasabi concentration. When taking into consideration the impact in all sample groups, wasabi induced the smallest change in comparison to the controls. The observation was confirmed by the Principal Component Analysis. It can be concluded that added spices could enhance specified sensory properties and thus possibly reduce the need for using the sweeteners as a means of making the product more desirable among the consumers.
