Firmness of the cubes was evaluated during 16 days of storage with a texture analyser (TAXT2i, Stable Micro System Ltd, England). Penetration tests using a 2 mm diameter stainless steel cylindrical probe, 5 kg load cell and 0.5 mm s−1 test speed were employed. The maximum peak measured during the test was taken as firmness (Rocculi et al., 2009).