Abstract: Sensory-oriented analysis was carried out to investigate the sour and sweet taste components in the Prunus mume fruit extract.Two samples of Prunus mume fruit extract were separated by gel permeation chromatography,the taste characteristics of each separated fraction was evaluated,and the sour and sweet taste characteristic components in the samples were obtained by freeze drying.The contents of sour and sweet components were determined by ion chromatography and high-performance liquid chromatography coupled with evaporative light scattering detection(HPLC-ELSD) respectively.The results showed that the sour components in Prunus mume fruit extracts were formic acid,acetic acid,malic acid and citric acid,and the contents of sour components in No.1 sample were significantly higher than them in No.2 sample.The sweet components in No.1 extracts were glucose and fructose.But maltotriose and maltotetraose were also determined except for glucose and fructose in No.2 sample.The contents of sweet components in No.2 sample were significantly higher than them in the No.1 sample.The method is helpful to identify the taste ingredients of food and food additives.