Tenderization Mechanism of Meat during Post-mortem Aging: The Calcium Theory of Meat Tenderization

摘要

Five main factors contribute to the overall eating quality of meat; tenderness, taste, odor, color and juiciness. Of these factors tenderness is considered the most important by the average consumer of many countries. Tenderness of meat is the sum total of the mechanical strength of skeletal muscle tissue and its weakening during post-mortem aging of meat. The former depends on species, breed, age, sex and individual skeletal muscle tissue of animal and fowl. Meat tenderness originates in structuraland biochemical properties of skeletal muscle fibers, especially myofibrils and desmin intermediate-filaments, and of the intramuscullar connective tissue, the endomysium and perimysium, which are composed of collagen fibrils and fibers. The mechanical stability of the endomysium and perimysium increases markedly with chronological aging, and the endomysium and perimysium end up in extremely regular and thickened patterns. Therefore, meat produced from old animal and fowl is tough and of lower eating quality.