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Title: EFFECT OF POST-CHILL AGING AND SODIUM TRIPOLYPHOSPHATE ON MOISTURE BINDING PROPERTIES, COLOR AND WARNER-BRATZLER SHEAR VALUES OF CHICKEN BREAST MEAT

Author
item YOUNG, LOUIS
item LYON, CLYDE

Submitted to: Journal Of Poultry Science
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: 6/9/1997
Publication Date: N/A
Citation: N/A

Interpretive Summary: As the poultry industry has shifted from marketing raw meat to finished products, steps in the preparation of the products such as marination have shifted from the retail store to the food manufacturing plant. Centralizing the preparation steps improves efficiency and saves both time and money. At the same time, retailers have begun to receive consumer complaints of meat toughness. This research identifies one of the prime reasons for the toughness complaints. The results show that poultry breast meat can be toughened if it is treated with polyphosphates - additives commonly used to improve meat juiciness and yield - too soon after slaughter. Food manufacturers can use this information to devise changes in their process which will eliminate the toughness problem.

Technical Abstract: The objective of this study was to assess the effects of treating chicken breast forequarters with sodium tripolyphosphate (STPP) after various post-chill storage times on meat quality. Sixty four commercially reared broilers (2 replicates of 32 birds each) were slaughtered and chilled, and then the forequarters (split breasts with spine and ribs) were harvested and aged for 0, 2, 4 or 6 h post-chill. After each aging period, one forequarter from each of sixteen birds was marinated with a NaCl solution and the opposite forequarter was marinated with the same NaCl solution containing STPP. The quarters were then cooked and the following traits measured: marinade absorption, cooking loss, objective color values and Warner-Bratzler shear values. As aging time prior to marination increased, cooking loss and redness of the cooked meat decreased, but marinade absorption and the color values were unaffected. STPP-treatment increased marinade absorption, decreased cooking losses and decreased cooked meat redness (P. < 0.05). Shear values decreased with aging time for both the control and STPP-treated breast meat. If the STPP treatment was applied immediately after carcass chilling, the STPP-treated meat exhibited shear values more than 60% greater than that of the controls (9.14 and 5.69 kg, respectively). Results indicate that time post-chill at which further processed products are treated with STPP can have a significant effect on quality, especially cooked product texture.