Effect of Ultimate pH on the Physicochemical and Biochemical Characteristics of Turkey Breast Muscle Showing Normal Rate of Postmortem pH Fall

Abstract

This experiment aimed to study the effect of ultimate pH (pH(u)) on the biochemical and physicochemical characteristics of turkey breast muscle with normal rate of postmortem pH fall. Five hundred turkey toms (12 wk old, 10 kg live weight) were randomly chosen from a commercial flock. At 24 h postmortem, 64 birds were randomly selected within the subgroup showing pH higher than 6.0 at 20 min postmortem and pH(u) lower than 6.1. These pH levels were used to exclude pale, soft, and exudative (PSE) meat and dark, firm, and dry (DFD) meat, respectively. The pH(u) was significantly correlated with luminance (L*; r = -0.37) and yellowness (b*; r = -0.36) at 24 h postmortem, drip losses (r = -0.56 to -0.62), thawing loss (r = -0.47), 80% compression (r = -0.29), yield of curing and cooking (r = 0.37), glycolytic potential at slaughter (r = -0.44) and lactate at 24 h postmortem (r = -0.47). Significant correlations were found between drip losses and compression test on cooked meat (r = 0.27 to 0.34). Cooking loss was correlated with WB shear force (r = 0.32). These results show that when PSE defects are excluded, the intensities of the correlations between pH(u) and meat quality traits are lower than those usually reported. The present data also indicate that the level of glycogen at time of slaughter poorly explains the variability in pH(u). Thus, further research is needed to identify the mechanisms explaining pH(u) variation in poultry muscle.

Effect of slaughter season on postmortem metabolic characteristics of muscle in the dromedary camel (Camelus dromedarius)

“…A similar finding was also reported by El-Rammouz et al (2004) in poultry meat. Moreover, in studies on beef by Abril et al (2001) and Villarroel et al (2003) and on broilers by Bowker and Zhuang (2015), it was shown that meat with a higher pH had greater water-holding capacity than that with a low pH.…”

“…The thawing loss was determined by method as described by El-Rammouz et al (2004). Fourty-eight hours after slaughter, the samples were placed in bag plastic content the liquid ethanol refrigerated at 4 °C and placed in freezing for 36 hours.…”

Mitochondrial respiratory and antioxidative enzyme activities in turkey meat

“…Further investigations are necessary and under progress to clarify this suggestion. The assortment of the present data with regard to the mean pH 24 h p.m. of the MPS was done because results of El Rammouz et al (2004) in turkeys and Berri et al (2007) in broiler showed that this pH is negatively correlated to L*, and the drip loss values, which was also shown in this study. However, there is a controversial discussion about the impact of pH 20 min p.m. in the literature, because this parameter is less related to poultry meat quality, whereas in pork pH is the most important factor for detecting PSE meat (Scheffler and Gerrard, 2007;Petracci et al, 2009).…”

Influence of crate height during slaughter transport on the welfare of male turkeys

“…The crate height did not have a significant effect on the turkey muscle metabolism measured as temperature, pH, and glycogen and lactate content. Turkey breast meat with a pH after 20 minutes greater than 6Á0 is considered to be non-PSE (pale, soft, exudative) meat, and similarly breast meat with a pH after 24 h lower than 6Á1 is non-DFD (dark, firm, dry) meat according to El Rammouz et al (2004). Breast meat in the present study fulfilled criteria for non-PSE and non-DFD meat.…”