A comprehensive study on the ability of the generalized Maxwell model to describe the stress relaxation behavior of food matrices is presented in this work. Five different food matrices were chosen as representative of a wide range of foods: agar gel, meat, ripened cheese "mozzarella" cheese and white pan bread. The above foods matrices were selected on the base of their macro-structure and compressive stress strain behavior. Stress relaxation tests were run on the above food matrices at room temperature. The relaxation times distribution function used in this investigation to describe the viscoelastic behavior of the investigated foods was obtained by summing two normal distribution functions with the means equal to zero. Results show that the proposed model satisfactorily fits the experimental data. Moreover, it was also found a substantial difference between the relaxation times distribution curves of the investigated bulky and spongy foods. (c) 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.