The effect of Eisenia foetida meal as a protein source on sensory attributes of broiler meat

摘要

The present study was aimed to evaluate the effect of different inclusion levels of earthworm meal (Eisenia foetida) on the sensory attributes of broiler chickens. A total of 180 day-old broiler chicks were assigned to five dietary treatments with three pens per treatment and 12 broiler chickens per pen from 1-35 days. Dietary treatments were as follows: 0% (EWO), 1% (EW1), 3% (EW3), 5% (EW5), and (EW10)10%. At day 35 of age 75 birds, were randomly selected for the determination of sensory attributes of the breast meat. Sensory attributes evaluated were aroma, juiciness, tenderness, flavour and amount of connective tissue and were measured by a semi-trained sensory panel. The findings of this study revealed that chicken aroma and juiciness of meat improved linearly (p 0.05) with the increasing inclusion levels of E. foetida meal. Nevertheless, chicken flavour scores reducesd with the increasing inclusion levels of earthworm meal. No dietary effect (p 0.05) was observed on metallic flavour, metallic aroma and chicken aroma. In conclusion, the E. foetida inclusion levels positively influenced sensory scores of broiler breast meat, where EW10 showed the best influence as compared to the other dietary treatment groups used in this study.