A STUDY OF CERTAIN FACTORS INFLUENCING THE JUICINESS OF MEAT ^{a, b}

Abstract

Experimentation has shown that tender cuts of beef, such as roasts and steaks, containing higher percentages of suet are juicier than lean cuts, as judged by a taste panel (1,2,4). The conclusion, that beef with more fat is more juicy, T o d d also be in accord with many of the studies of press fluid and total water content (4, 5, 7, 12). However, Satorius and Child (9) haye indicated no relationship between fat content and the amount of press fluid. I n the recent work of Gaddis, Hankins, and Hiner ( 4 ) , it was found that both the scores for quality and for quantity of juice vere influenced by the amount of intra-muscular f a t and the fat content of the press fluid. These workers suggested that low intra-fat meat should yield more press fluid than that of high fat content if the meat were cooked with little moisture loss; if the meat were overcooked, the reverse would be true (4). Thus, a high fat content coupled with low temperature cookery for short periods yields more juicy meat.Little is knoxvn of the mechanism bj7 which suet adds t o the experience of juiciness. Whether the presence of intra-muscular fat induces a greater flow of salira or a different mouth feeling or whether it has been associated previously with tender meat from which juice is more easily pressed are psychological factors which may be involved in the experience of meat juiciness. One suggestion has been made that suet changes the relative amount of juiciness because of differences in the rate of heat transfer ( I l ) , and, therefore, differences in the degree of cooking. The fact that temperature and length of cooking affect the juiciness of beef roasts and steaks has long been established (8).Further work on the effect of suet on the juiciness of beef and on heat transfer is needed especially for less-tender cuts which require moist heat cookery. The interrelationships between the many factors which influence meat quality suggested the development of a small-sample method of braising and of determining cooking losses and relative juiciness wherein those factors could be investigated over a wide range of controlled conditions. Such a method has in the present study been applied in Experiment I t o blended fat and lean beef under 3 sets of conditions and iii Experiment

Effect of thickness and location of minced fat on cooking times and weight losses of composite beef joints

“…Figure 5 clearly shows the large difference between the heating patterns of the minced and unminced fat. This result supports the work of Siemers & Hanning (1953) who found that minced suet heated more rapidly than intact suet while Lowe (1955) found a similar result using pressed and unpressed suet. Table 4.…”

“…The effect of surface fat on meat cooking times has been investigated by several authors. Siemers & Hanning (1953) and Weir (1960) found that unminced fat at the surface reduced the cooking times of pieces of meat heated in closed containers at low temperatures, but their results cannot be related directly to high temperature open pan roasting. Thille, Williamson & Morgan (1932) roasted typical commercial joints with or without surface fat and found that the presence of fat reduced the cooking time.…”

Effect Of Age And Wholesale Cuts On The Quality Of Indigenous Sheep Carcass

“…The value was highly significant (P<0.01) among the cuts and ages (Table 1 and Table 2). The degree of shrinkage on cooking is directly correlated with loss of juiciness to the palate (Siemers and Hanning, 1953). Good quality meat is juicier than that of poor quality.…”

Heat transfer and temperature of foods during processing∗

“…This is supported by the slower heat penetration of suet-covered beef. 236 The temperature profiles comparing heat transfer of water and fat reported by Bentgsson et al 218 would also indicate this.…”