Capsaicinoids in Food: An Update on Pretreatment and Analysis Methods since 2010

Capsaicinoids, whose basic chemical structure is the vanilla amide of n-nonanoic acid, are responsible for chili pepper fruits' spicy flavor (pungency) and multiple pharmacological actions. Capsaicinoids are widely used to produce intense flavor food additives due to their sensory attributes of pungency, aroma, and color. To ensure strict quality control for capsaicinoids and maximize their positive effects, valid and sensitive pretreatment and determination methods are urgently needed. Consequently, this review provides a comprehensive summary of capsaicinoids’ preparation and analytical technologies in food samples. Pretreatment techniques mainly include liquid-liquid extraction, solid-phase extraction, solid-phase microextraction, and dispersive solid-phase microextraction, among others. Detection methods include liquid chromatography coupled with different detectors, gas chromatography, electrochemical sensor methods, capillary electrophoresis, etc. Furthermore, the advantages and disadvantages of various pretreatment and analytical methods are compared and discussed. Thus, the present paper has attempted to shed light on novel and traditionalpretreatment methods and determination approaches and provided proper comments about their new developments and applications.