The Impact of a Consecutive Process of Pulsed Electric Field, Sous-Vide Cooking, and Reheating on the Properties of Beef Semitendinosus Muscle

• Published in: Foods Vol. 9; no. 11; p. 1674
• Main Authors: Jeong, Se-Ho, Kim, Eui-Chan, Lee, Dong-Un
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Basel MDPI AG 01.11.2020; MDPI
• Subjects: Beef; Connective tissue; Cooking; Cutting force; Cuttings; Electric field strength; Electric fields; Food; Food science; Heating; Meat; Muscles; Myoglobins; Pretreatment; Properties; pulsed electric field; Raw materials; Sous vide technology; sous-vide cooking; Tenderization; Testing; texture property; South Korea; United Kingdom > UK; United States > US
• ISSN: 2304-8158; 2304-8158
• DOI: 10.3390/foods9111674

The effects of a consecutive process of pulsed electric field (PEF) treatment, sous-vide cooking, and reheating on the properties of beef semitendinosus muscle were investigated. Fresh meats were PEF-treated with different electric field strengths of 1.0, 1.5, and 2.0 kV/cm, and then the control and PEF-pretreated beef samples were sous-vide cooked at 60 °C for up to 24 h. The PEF pretreatment resulted in tenderization of the fresh meat proportional to the increase in the electric field strength. A significant decrease in cutting force (by 35%) was observed after PEF treatment at 2.0 kV/cm. The hardness and chewiness of the meat were also significantly reduced by PEF treatment. After sous-vide cooking, the PEF-pretreated samples exhibited a significantly reduced cutting force, redness value (a*), and myoglobin content (mg/g) (p < 0.05). However, there were no significant differences in cooking loss and drip loss (p > 0.05). When the sous-vide-cooked meats were reheated in an oven (230 °C, 5 min), the reduced cutting force induced by the PEF pretreatment was retained.