The Role of Lipids and Glycerol in Determining the Shelf-life of Glycerol Desorbed Intermediate Moisture Meat Products

During storage of glycerol desorbed intermediate moisture beef at 38°C the marked loss of eating quality, demonstrated by increasing loss of nitrogen solubility in sodium dodecyl sulphate (SDS) plus β-mercaptoethanol, loss of haemoprotein character, decrease in pH and the formation of water-soluble hydroxyproline containing fragments, is not markedly affected by the presence of oleic acid and/or butylated hydroxytoluene. In addition, gas-liquid chromatographic analysis of the lipid fractions suggests that, in these meats, the relative composition of the neutral phospholipid fractions does not change to any marked extent during storage. However, the TBA and peroxide values, which are very high in the freshly prepared meats, do decrease quite markedly during storage. Consideration of these results suggests that, in glycerol desorbed meats, glycerol oxidation products are the major reactants leading to loss of eating quality.