PREDICTING SHELF LIFE OF CHICKEN BURGER PRODUCED FROM SURIMI UNDER COMBINED USE OF THYME ESSENTIAL OIL AND MODIFIED ATMOSPHERE PACKAGING: The effect of essential oils on new burgers

In the present research, the mixed use of thyme essential oil (EO) and Modified Atmosphere Packaging (MAP) treatments is studied to increase the quality and the shelf life of burgers prepared from surimi and chicken meat which were refrigerated at 2°C for 27 days. Obviously, there was a significant difference (p < 0.001) between chemical and microbiological analyses of burger treated with thyme EO, free of EOs and packed in the air or in the MAP. So burger shelf life was extended by 18 days with the combination of MAP packaging with thyme EO. Also, Artificial Neural Network (ANN) was used to forecast the shelf life of produced burgers under thyme essential oil and MAP influence. The model obtained from ANN has a higher (R2) and less RMSE in predicting the shelf life of produced burgers under the combined use of thyme essential oil and MAP.