Effects of beef enhancement with non-meat ingredients, blade tenderization, and vacuum tumbling on quality attributes of four beef cuts stored in a high oxygen environment

The objective of this study was to evaluate the effects of non-meat ingredients, blade tenderization and vacuum-tumbling on the textural, visual and sensory characteristics of steaks from Biceps femoris, Supraspinatus, Triceps brachii long head, and Longissimus dorsi muscles packaged in high oxygen, modified atomosphere (MAP) system. United Department of Agriculture (USDA) Select muscles (n=72) from each cut were obtained from a commercial processor over three processing days. Muscles were aged for five days at 4?C. Denuded muscles within a processing day were randomly assigned to one of 24 treatments. This study was a 2 x 4 x 3 factorial arrangement where treatments were control, injection (injected or non-injected), blade tenderization (0, 1, or 2 passes) and vacuum-tumbling (0, 5, 10 or 20 minutes). Injected muscles contained up to 10% of a brine containing 1.55% potassium lactate, 0.1% sodium diacetate, 0.3% sodium tripolyphosphate blend and 0.4% salt in the final product. Muscles were vacuumtumbled and blade tenderized sequentially after injection. Steaks from the muscles were stored in a high oxygen (80% O2, 20% CO2) MAP system for 0, 3, 7, 10 and 14 days at 2?C. Steaks were evaluated for package purge (%), Warner-Bratzler shear force (kg), cook loss (%), cook time (min), pH, CIE L* a* b* color space values and trained color panel scores on each storage day. A trained descriptive attribute sensory panel evaluated steaks on day 1 only. Warner-Bratzler shear force (P<0.01) and trained sensory panel results (P<0.05) showed that the addition of non-meat ingredients improved tenderness in all four muscles. Sensory detectable connective tissue was lower (P<0.01) in injected steaks for all muscles except in Biceps femoris steaks. Injected steaks had higher pH (P<0.01) measurements than non-injected treatments in all muscles except the Triceps brachii long head. Neither blade tenderization nor vacuum-tumbling had consistent effects in all four muscles. Vacuum-tumbled Biceps femoris steaks had lower bitter flavor aromatics (P<0.05). In conclusion, enhancing beef with non-meat ingredients had the greatest impact on the quality attributes of high connective tissue cuts and Longissimus dorsi steaks.