Effect of bioprotectants on turkey sausage

Abstract

[ACCESS RESTRICTED TO THE UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI AT AUTHOR'S REQUEST.]Food pathogens are of great public health significance, but the spoilage bacteria cause tremendous loss to the food industry. The objective of this study was to determine the effectiveness of selected bioprotectants on the quality and microbial characteristics of vacuum-packaged turkey sausage at 4⁰C over a period of 14 days. The bioprotectant used in this study was MicroGARD[superscript TM] 510 (MG510) which is essentially cultured dextrose and MicroGARD[superscript TM] 300 (MG300) which is cultured skim milk. Finely comminuted sausages were made with typical curing and seasoning ingredients and seven treatments were created using MG510 and MG300 at concentrations of 0.2%, 0.3%, 0.45% and 0.4%, 0.7% and 0.9%, respectively, plus one control without bioprotectant treatment. The sausages were cooked, vacuum packaged, and stored in a refrigerator at 4⁰C for evaluation at 0, 7 and 14 days. Samples were tested for pH, water holding capacity, a[w] [subscript], color, texture profile, puncture resistance and microbial content. The microbial analysis was done by plating on yeast and mold (YM) agar, MRS media, and plate count agar (PCA) to determine the effectiveness of the treatments. The log reduction values due to cooking were significant (P [less than] 0.05) for all the treatments. Additionally, there was a significant day of storage difference for log reduction values for all three microbiological measurements. The higher the concentration of bioprotectants used, the more the deviation from the control values. The log reduction was not dependent on the concentration of bioprotectants used for YM and PCA media. The highest concentrations of each MicroGARD[superscript TM] product caused some minor changes in quality attributes but may be effective in reducing bacterial populations for up to two weeks after cooking and vacuum packaging turkey sausage products.