Determination of fat in foods by compleximetric back-titration with ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid

Abstract

A titrimetric method has been developed for the determination of fat in solid or liquid foods. The method is based on the hydrolysis of fat, precipitation of carboxylate anions with Ba^II and the compleximetric back-titration of the excess of Ba^II with ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid. The relative standard deviations for the analysis of different solid foods were in the range 1.04–1.53%. Fat levels in liquid milk of as low as 0.3% were determined with good results; however, a correction had to be made, as 7.2 ± 1% of the fatty acids comprising milk fat do not precipitate with Ba^II.