SUMMARY
As an introduction to a long‐term investigation of meat tenderness, seven series of comparisons were made between sensory and objective evaluations of the tenderness of roasted lamb rib‐loins. Using a tenderometer based on that of Volodkevich, high coefficients of correlation (0.68‐0.94) were found despite the occasional occurrence of large variations in tenderness within single muscles and the detection of slight panel fluctuation in three of the more prolonged series. Sensory assessment of tenderness was shown to be more nearly linearly related to either the reciprocal or the square root of shear force than to shear force itself.
SUMMARY— The tenderness of lamb loin is affected greatly by the time‐temperature pattern imposed on the dressed carcazs during the onset of rigor mortis. Very significant toughness develops in the longissimus dorsi muscles of carcasses exposed to low temperatures within about 16 hr of slaughter. This “processing toughness” is shown to be unrelated to the lack of aging. It appears to be due to muscle fiber shortening, earlier demonstrated to be responsible for massive toughening in excised muscles. Both cold shortening and thaw shortening are capable of toughness production, the latter type becoming prominent when meat, previously frozen before rigor completion, is cooked without a preliminary thawing.
The influence of sire and age on the palatability characteristics of rib-loins from Southdown X Romney lambs was studied. Twelve lambs were selected from each of six Southdown sire groups, and one-third of these lambs were slaughtered at 17, 22, and 27 weeks of age respectively. Neither taste panel nor tenderometer detected any over-all effect due to sire on tenderness, and panel scores for texture, juiciness, and flavour of cooked meat did not vary significantly between sires. Both the taste panel scores and the tenderometer values showed that older lambs were less tender than younger lambs. The results indicated that the fatness of the lamb carcass had no influence on the tenderness of the meat.
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