The instrumental and sensory texture attributes of beef muscles (M. longissimus dorsi and M. semirnernbrunosus) were compared after curing and thermal treatments. Shear, compression and puncture tests were carried out with an UTM Instron 4301 and the sensory evaluation was made with the score method. The force values obtained for puncture test gave a greater degree of correlation with the sensory tenderness, hardness and elasticity than the shear test forces. The shear test forces were found to significantly correlate with sensory tenderness only for muscles with perpendicular orientation of fibres to the direction of shear blade movement. The evaluation of beef texture with compression test was dependent on the level of sample deformation degree. The force values of compression were found to correlate significantly with elasticity and juiciness of meat up to 60% deformation levels, but at deformation levels higher than 60% appeared significant correlation with tenderness and hardness. The obtained results showed the usefulness of puncture test with proposed parameters for the instrumental measurements of beef texture.
I IntroductionTexture takes a significant part in the quality acceptance of food products. It is a group of properties resulting from natural structure of the food elements, their mutual arrangement, interaction and way in which they are perceived by the human senses [5,14, 251. Texture is also the attribute deciding about meat and meat products quality. It depends on many factors such as: chemical composition, structure, physical properties, processing methods, shape and many others, which mutual relationships and intensity designating this property as complex and thereby difficult to univocal defining. Texture involves such attributes as hardness, tenderness, fihrousness, guminess, elasticity, firmness, juiciness and many others [2, 3, 12, 15, 251. In evaluation of meat product quality, texture takes usually the second place after flavour 14, 11,201.Meat texture results from the influence of basic actomyosin factor and connective-tissue factor, which is supplementary. Meat texture highly correlates with water absorption and swelling indices of proteins. This first factor influences the tenderness of beef more than pork [21, 23, 24, 291. According to Bouton and Harris [6], the meat texture depends on two factors: the cohesion between muscle fibres and the strength of fibres itself.Texture is the category of quality, which is perceived, first of all, kinaesthetically. The instrumental measurements are however necessary for describing this complex attribute by numerical values, thus giving for texture a quantitative meaning. Instrumental methods of texture measurement have an advantage over sensory methods, because they are less time consuming, cheaper, more repeatable, free from variability caused by psychological, physiological and environmental factors influencing the human responses. On the other hand, the advantage of sensory methods over instrumental methods of texture measurement is the compl...