INFLUENCES OF STORAGE CONDITIONS ON BEEF TEXTURE

This study aimed to explore the influences of different storage conditions on beef texture from both micro-perspective and macro-perspective. In this study, the postmortem beef was stored under three storage conditions, i.e. (1) freezing point temperature + vacuum packaging (Cv), (2) 0 ℃ + vacuum packaging (Zv), (3) 4 ℃ + vacuum packaging (Fv). During the storage, sulfhydryl group (-SH) content, myofiber diameter, sarcomere length (SL), myofibril fragmentation index (MFI) and shear force (SF) were determined regularly. The result showed that: under above three conditions, both -SH content and myofiber diameter gradually decreased while MFI increased. With the treatment of Cv, Zv and Fv, myofiber diameter decreased by 46.67 %, 52.27 % and 57.23 % respectively on the 24th day. The SL was minimized at the 1st day with Zv and Fv condition and at the 4th day with Cv condition. The SF of three types of samples behaved in the similar pattern as increasing firstly and then decrease, however, the change of samples with Cv condition was much slower than those with Zv and Fv condition. Therefore, we conclude that Cv condition can effectively delay the rigor mortis and rigor-off processes of beef, and thus, enable the beef maintain good quality for a long time, following by Zv condition and then Fv condition.