The Institute of Food Hygiene at the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Leipzig University, has collaborated with the Leipzig Chamber of Crafts, the German Butchers' Association, and a regional butcher's shop to develop a modular blended learning training concept for reducing fat and salt in sausage and meat products. In this project, funded by the Federal Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Regional Identity, the results from a wide range of research and development projects conducted by the Institute of Food Hygiene were aggregated and are now being offered as training for the butchery trade.
This study investigates the influence of wood type on the pyrolysis behavior, sensory properties, and texture of Vienna sausages. Two hardwoods, beech and oak, and one softwood, alder, were used for smoke generation. Analyses of the ember bed temperature showed that alder exhibited higher temperatures due to its terpene content and lower density. Smoke color evaluation revealed minimal visual differences with AE2000 values below 3.0, suggesting that the changes were not easily perceptible to the human eye. Texture analysis revealed no significant influence of wood species on initial bite or casing tensile strength. Sensory evaluation revealed significant differences in sensory properties between samples, but no consistent preference for a particular wood species, with differences decreasing during the 28-day storage period. The results demonstrate the complexity of the smoking process and the need to consider multiple factors when optimizing it.
Although cleaning and disinfection measures form part of the daily hygiene routine in production facilities, inadequate implementation is often the starting point for microbial contamination of food. Repeated findings of Listeria in meat products and the production environment demonstrate that current routines are insufficient to effectively eliminate critical sources and niches of pathogens. Not only does the status quo of operational decontamination strategies need to be improved in terms of current hygiene weaknesses, it also faces growing challenges in terms of sustainability and environmental protection. Integrating alternative methods and technologies, such as ultrasound or UV-C irradiation, could be a potential solution. Combined applications have been proven to significantly improve cleaning and disinfection success. Furthermore, the physical principles of these technologies have the potential to reduce the long-term use of chemical agents.
The aim of the study was to investigate the influence of broiler transport length on safety and quality parameters of raw and smoked chicken breasts. The study was carried out on Ross 308 broiler chickens reared and transported under similar commercial conditions, while the only varying factor was the length of transport. Transport was categorized as short (20 km) and long (170 km) and from meat (m. pectoralis major) obtal-ned from such transported brollers, two experimental groups were for-med: short transport [ST] and long transport [LT] group, respectively. Each of these groups had a raw chicken breasts and further processed smoked chicken breasts variant. At the beginning of storage, raw chicken breasts from ST group showed higher pH value, water holding capacity (WHC) and shear force and lower TBARS and L value, but during storage. TBARS and L value Increased, and pH value and shear force decreased. On the contrary, in LT group WHC, L*, and a increased and TBARS, b*, and shear force decreased. At the beginning of the storage of smoked chicken breasts, only color (L*, a*, b*) significantly changed in both groups. At the end of the storage period, samples from ST group showed higher b* and lower pH value, whereas samples from LT group showed higher b* and shear force values. Higher bacterial counts were observed in all raw LT samples at the beginning of the storage period, except for MicrocOCCL During storage, bacterial counts increased in ST samples, but in LT sam-ples Microccoci increased, and total count of psychrophiles decreased. Bacterial counts in smoked chicken breasts were distinctly lower than in raw meat. Cross-section appearance, showed higher scores throughout the entire storage period in the smoked chicken breast from ST group in comparison to LT group, color and color stability, odor and taste, texture and juiciness had a higher score on 1(st )and 15(th) day of storage, and exter-nal appearance on the 30(th )day of storage.
High intake of food reach in saturated fat and calories could lead to chronic non-infectious diseases in consumers. Meat products including cooked emulsified sausages are considered as such type of food, so different strategies for fat and energy reduction are widely investigated. Inulin-collagen suspension showed good properties to completely substitute fatty tissue in emulsified sausages. In this study, two groups of sausages were produced in order to evaluate their nutritional properties: control, containing 25% fatty tissue, and low-fat sausage produced without fatty tissue and enriched with inulin-collagen suspension instead. Low-fat sausage contained 0.9% fat, providing fat reduction of 96.5% compared to the control. The sum of fatty acids (SFA) and of trans-fatty acids was 0.31%. Caloric value was reduced for 78.1%, the share of proteins in total energy was 68.7%, and the share of saturated fatty acids in total energy was only 3.9%. Despite the addition of collagen and consequently significant increase in connective tissue proteins content, the quality requirements given by the regulations for the frankfurter type sausages were not disturbed, as connective tissue free meat protein content was 10.1% and connective tissue free meat proteins in meat proteins was 84.9%. The content of potentially harmful SFA was 96% and of n-6 fatty acids 98% lower than in the control group of products.
Omega-3 fatty acids and the ratio between omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids are of great importance for the human metabolism. They are consumed either as pure oils or in fortified foods. In this study, nine oils from plant sources and three oils from marine sources were analyzed for their fatty acid composition and sensory attributes to evaluate as additives in the food industry. Fatty acid analysis of the edible oils (n = 9) was carried out using gas chromatography, and all oils were tested sensorially by a trained panel. According to the research conducted, chia oil was found to have the highest omega-3 fatty acid content among the vegetable oils studied. Tuna oil and algae oil showed particularly favorable results in terms of the fatty acid pattern, especially the high levels of omega-3 fatty acids in relation to omega-6 fatty acids. These results suggest that chia oil is a promising plant source of omega-3 fatty acids, while tuna oil and seaweed oil can also be recommended as edible oils from marine sources for potential incorporation into foods. Sunflower, camelina, chia, tuna oil and all tested linseed oil varieties were particularly convincing from a sensory point of view. However, further research is needed to investigate the effects of these oils in food as nutritionally valuable additives.
The popularity of plant-based meat alternatives is increasing, with a growing number of companies entering the market to meet this demand. While the manufacturing process differs from that of meat production and processing, the microbial diversity of plant-based meat analogues has been shown to resemble that of conventional meat products. This suggests that spoilage and pathogenic microorganisms may have similar growth conditions, which could pose a risk to consumers. Furthermore, the increasing consumption of plant-based meat alternatives has the potential to significantly increase the population's exposure to mycotoxins. Experts are increasingly calling for legal regulations regarding permissible limits and maximum levels for product-specific microbial hazards. However, there are currently no corresponding specifications for plant-based meat alternatives, which leads to uncertainties in assessing food safety. The article summarises current findings on the microbial quality of meat analogues, taking into account the applicable legal situation and possible health risks.
Ground meat and ground meat products are very popular meat products that are usually made from beef or beef portions and are often sold directly to the end consumer or used as an intermediate product in industrial meat product production. To ensure consistent product quality, knowledge of the relationship between process, structure and functionality is crucial. These have not yet been systematically investigated, which is why there is a lack of fundamental scientific knowledge in this area. The aim of this study was to determine the influence of increasing mixing times (0.5, 3, 6, 9, 12 and 15 min) and fat contents (15.10%, 18.49%, 22.4% fat) of the beef on the structure and functionality of hamburgers. It was hypothesized that longer mixing times would introduce more energy, exposing the muscle cells to higher mechanical stress, which would lead to increased disintegration. In addition, higher fat contents of the raw material would led to a softer material with lower cutting resistance. This would lead to an uneven cutting pattern and a higher degree of non-intact cells. The chemical composition of the raw material, the structure, the cooking and drip loss, the texture and the visual and sensory properties of the hamburgers were investigated. The results only partially confirm the original hypothesis and show that both the mixing process step and the fat content of the hamburgers have only a minor influence on the structure, functional and sensory properties. The process step of grinding and the influence of the processing temperature proved to be decisive for structural changes in the ground meat.
Salmonella Enteritidis and S. Typhimurium are epidemiologically significant serotypes, and their rapid detection is of great importance from a public health perspective. During this study, the real-time PCR protocol for detecting S. Enteritidis and S. Typhimurium was optimized, and the molecular characterization of 60 isolates of S. Enteritidis and 60 isolates of S. Typhimurium from food, animal feed, and poultry feces was performed. The optimization of the real-time PCR protocol for detecting the safA gene of Salmonella Enteritidis and the fliA-IS200 gene of S. Typhimurium in chicken meat and poultry neck skins was successfully completed. A 100% agreement was achieved between the alternative and standard methods, with a sensitivity of 1-10 cfu/25 g of sample. By comparing two different methods of DNA extraction for Salmonella spp., lower Cq values were obtained after the procedure using the commercial preparation "InstaTM Gene matrix (BioRad, USA)" than with the thermal lysis-based procedure. The typing of 60 Salmonella Enteritidis isolates and 60 S. Typhimurium isolates using the real-time PCR protocol for detecting the safA gene of S. Enteritidis and the fliA-IS200 gene of S. Typhimurium showed that the selected sequences are specific for the serotypes being examined.
The use of sodium chloride (NaCl) in the food industry is increasingly being criticized as it is suspected of having potentially harmful properties. For this reason, various methods are being pursued to research alternatives to its use. However, the reduction of NaCl and nitrite harbors microbiological risks and can also have an impact on the technological properties of the products. In the experiment described here, various microbiological and physico-chemical parameters of raw sausages with different NaCl and nitrite contents were examined over a storage period of 140 days. The aim was to investigate the shelf life of raw sausages produced with different recipes in comparison to a raw sausage with conventional NaCl and nitrite contents (reference) in order to be able to make a statement about the possibilities and limits of the reduction of NaCl and nitrite.
