Submitted by Thomas Pröller, meat-n-more on , Published in Process
At the Fraunhofer IGB, a drying process was developed that dries with superheated steam instead of hot air. Potato chips, cat food or mineral raw materials can be dried much faster, gentler and with lower energy input than before.
Potato chips, pumpkin seeds and apple chips, dry food for dogs and cats, but also sludges or building materials must be dried before they are processed or packaged and find their way through the trade to the consumer. Usually is dried with hot air. This takes a long time, requires large drying systems and consumes a lot of energy. Often so much energy that the drying step up to more than 90 makes up one percent of the energy requirement of the entire production chain.
Asklepios Klinik in Hamburg used special door handles and light switches against antibiotic-resistant bacteria - patients benefit
Door handles and light switches made of copper are an effective additional means of stopping the spread of dangerous germs in hospitals. This is the result of a field test that has received worldwide attention at the Asklepios Klinik Wandsbek in Hamburg. In the summer of 2008 and winter of 2008/2009, two hospital wards were equipped with door handles, door panels and light switches made of special copper alloys over a period of several months.
The neighboring areas kept their conventional handles and switches made of aluminum, stainless steel or plastic for research purposes. Independent scientists from the University of Halle-Wittenberg regularly took samples and compared the number of germs on the various contact surfaces. The desired effect occurred particularly on the door handles. For example, under everyday conditions it could be demonstrated that the number of antibiotic-resistant bacteria (MRSA) was reduced by a third. The repopulation of copper door handles and copper switches by germs has also been significantly reduced. This had an immediate benefit for the patients: In the wards equipped with copper clinics, there was a positive trend towards lower infection rates in patients during the study period, which, however, needs to be examined more closely in larger studies.
Submitted by Thomas Pröller, meat-n-more on , Published in Process
Exhibition of Meat Research
16 lectures in three thematic areas and an international workshop to safeguard the food chain "Meat" provided the meat experts, the 5. to 7. May 2009 to 44. Kulmbacher Week of the Max Rubner Institute (MRI) had traveled to the latest results of meat research.
Beside the national view also from russian and serbian control room the topic area "slaughtering and processing technology" was presented. Veterinarian Matthias Moje from MRI-Kulmbach presented the concept of using "6-Axis Standard Industrial Robots", which has been in use for four years, extensively. The concept has proven itself, even if no final assessment can be made from a slaughter hygiene point of view, for industrial pig slaughtering, the expert judged. Attempts by researchers of the Russian Academy of Agricultural Sciences to extract flavorings from spices with the help of carbon dioxide also led to interesting results: Dina Trifonova, from the All-Russian Research Institute of Meat Industry - VM Gorbatov, Moscow stated that here not only for the food sector, but also in the field of cosmetics and medicine to open up great potential.
Submitted by Thomas Pröller, meat-n-more on , Published in Quality & Analytics
More safety for consumers
A new guide for traceability within feed and food chains are medium industry, government and consumer organizations and others interested in an efficient tool with which to identify weak points in the production chain. The "Stakeholders' Guide" was under an international workshop from 6. to 7. On May Max Rubner Institute (MRI) took place in Kulmbach, presents. It is a result of the EU project Sigma chain at which 11 partners from science and industry from 7 countries participated.
The special scientific approach of the project is to be emphasized: SigmaChain is cross-chain and thus goes beyond existing HACCP and other concepts that are supposed to guarantee safety throughout the production process. "In times of ever longer and more complex production chains, this is an important addition to current systems and makes a significant contribution to the safety and quality of food," says Dr. Fredi Schwägele, head of the analytics working group at the Max Rubner Institute.
Summary of a presentation of 44. Kulmbacher week 2009
It is known that the sensory quality of meat products depends to a large extent on the quality of the flavoring substances used. Modern flavors that are obtained on the basis of CO2 extraction not only have a consistent quality, but also have biological, antimicrobial and antioxidant activities. However, the even distribution of highly concentrated extracts over the entire volume of a meat product is a major problem. There is also no doubt that technologies need to be developed which make it possible to incorporate CO2 extracts from spices as emulsions in meat products.
A special method for evaluating the quality of aroma emulsions made it possible to find technologies that work on the basis of ultrasound treatment. In order to find out the effects of the technological parameters of the ultrasonic treatment, various aroma emulsions were investigated with regard to their stability during storage, the composition of the test batches being chosen so that 100 ml of the aroma emulsion were used instead of 100 g of sausage meat.
Summary of a presentation of 44. Kulmbacher week 2009
In the manufacture of meat products, in addition to the spices, spice extracts, which are obtained through the use of supercritical carbon dioxide, are increasingly being processed. Their advantage lies in their reproducible quality and the lower germ content. For better distribution of the aromas in the sausage meat and thus also a clear sensory perceptibility of the aromas in the finished product, the oily aroma extracts can be emulsified in an aqueous solution by means of ultrasound treatment.
The aim was to determine whether the use of ultrasonically treated aroma emulsions has a positive effect on the quality of cooked sausage. In four test series, scalded sausages were produced with natural spices (control batch) and aroma emulsions (test batch). One day after production and after 6 weeks of storage, the following parameters were recorded: sensory quality, consistency / firmness, water binding capacity (jelly deposit), color, shelf life as well as protein, fat, ash, nitrite / nitrate.
Submitted by Thomas Pröller, meat-n-more on , Published in Process
Summary of a presentation of 44. Kulmbacher week 2009
The production of high-quality cured cured products, including beef and sheep, has a long tradition in the mountainous region of Zlatibor in south-western Serbia. Raw cured beef and sheep are limited to a few specialties in the Western European market. Therefore, a closer look at these Serbian products should pay off if they could enrich the local offer.
Beef and sheep ham and the specialty "Stelja" (made from whole, boneless, unfolded sheep carcasses) are made according to traditional methods. After dry / wet pickling in containers (in some cases only with common salt), watering and drying, 15 through 20 are continuously smoked over beech wood for a controlled period of time, with no controlled climatic conditions. This results in relatively dark, more dried products. Sheep ham from the leg (n = 9), shoulder (n = 1) and ribs (with back muscles) of "Stelja" (n = 10) and beef ham from roast beef (n = 2) and tail roll (n = 5) were examined , In addition to physical parameters (pH, aw value), the main constituents water, fat, protein, ash, as well as curing agents (NaCl, NO2, NO3), fat indices (peroxide number, acid number), fatty acid patterns and benzo (a) pyrene were determined. A sensory examination was carried out according to the DLG 5 dot scheme.
Submitted by Thomas Pröller, meat-n-more on , Published in Quality & Analytics
Summary of a presentation of 44. Kulmbacher week 2009
During the smoking of meat products Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons (PAHs) are formed by incomplete combustion of wood. The group of PAH include about 660 different compounds, some of which are due to their toxic, mutagenic and carcinogenic properties of great importance.
In one study, PAHs were investigated in curing smoke during the smoking process. The resulting from the combustion of beech wood smoke came from two traditional smokehouses in the region Zlatibor (Serbia) and was in two different cartridges (PUF and XAD-2) collected. the 16 were analyzed by the EU as priority PAHs classified by means of a Fast-GC / HRMS method.
Submitted by Thomas Pröller, meat-n-more on , Published in Quality & Analytics
Summary of a presentation of 44. Kulmbacher week 2009
Regulation (EC) No. 882 / 2004 from 29. April 2004 looks in order to verify compliance with feed and food law in the European Union for the designation of Community - Reference Laboratories (community reference laboratories; CRLs) and National Reference Laboratories (NRLs) ago. Any concrete indication of CRLs for the different residues and contaminants carried in Regulation (EC) No. 776 / 2006 from 23. May 2006. The CRLs to inform inter alia, the NRLs on analysis methods, perform proficiency tests and offer training courses for NRLs. The tasks of NRLs consist essentially in a tight cooperation with the relevant CRL, the coordination of the activities of official laboratories and carrying out comparative tests between the official national laboratories.
At the Max Rubner Institute (MRI) in Kulmbach needed for the EU-wide interlaboratory studies reference materials for the CRL for dioxins and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), (Chemical and Veterinary Investigation Office, Freiburg, Germany) and the CRL were for Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons (PAH ) (joint Research Centre of the European Commission, Geel, Belgium) made. As reference materials for dioxins and PCBs Brühwurstkonserven were made in two different contamination levels. Was deliberately left out on doping the material with standard connections and only resorted to biased by environmental influences meat. The preselection of meat used was based on the knowledge of the current load situation of dioxins and PCBs in meat from the results of the research project "Status Survey on dioxins and PCBs in feed and food of animal origin".
Submitted by Thomas Pröller, meat-n-more on , Published in Quality & Analytics
Summary of a presentation of 44. Kulmbacher week 2009
The product quality of an acquired by the final consumer meat product is determined by a variety of factors. During the production, storage and transport the quality is affected by hygienic conditions, temperature, type of packaging, storage time. For detecting and monitoring of these factors suitable measuring devices are required.
"FreshScan" - a project funded by the BMBF project - is exactly at those points. A non-destructive measurement of the meat condition by means of a hand detector, by the packaging, is the main objective of the project. The development of a microchip for on-line recording of the parameters such as time and temperature is a further object.
Summary of a presentation of 44. Kulmbacher week 2009
On the basis of findings from the literature, the presented experiment was to investigate how far the intramuscular fat content can be increased in a standard mast by targeted undersupply of pigs with lysine and sulfur-containing amino acids. In addition, it was to be examined which side effects this has in relation to further characteristics of the meat quality as well as the mast performance and carcass composition. 94 Piétrain-NN * Landrace crosses (45 male-castrated and 49 female) were split into four experimental groups. The control group (I) received a diet with adequate amino acid contents. In the other three groups, the proportion of lysine (II), methionine and cystine (III) or lysine plus methionine and cystine (IV) in the final feed (from approx. 70 kg live weight) was reduced to approx. 60% compared to the control diet.
In general, only the two groups that had received too little lysine had major changes, and especially those with group II. Their animals showed a poorer feed conversion (0,4 kg more feed per kg gain) than the control group, while the animals showed poorer lysine Monday increases - not significantly - decreased by about 60 g. The carcasses were more greasy, so that the muscle meat percentage decreased on average by 2,5% and the belly rating deteriorated by 9 points, as part of an 1,2 points scale. The chemical-physical characteristics of meat quality, such as pH, electrical conductivity, color and the various parameters of water-binding capacity, did not change. The intramuscular fat content at 1,2, 1,4 and 2,7% at two different sites in the M. longissimus dorsi and the M. semimembranosus in the control group increased solely due to the syphilitic deficiency on 2,0, 2,2 and 3,7%; and the total fat content of the "comb" section (transversal over 3, cervical vertebrae) increased from 14,4 to 16,5%. In addition, there was a significant increase in the content of monounsaturated fatty acids in the fatty acid profile of the intramuscular fat at the expense of polyene fatty acids. The described effects, however, only led to tendential improvements in sensory evaluation and instrumental delicacy. Thus, it can be seen that the disadvantages associated with such a feeding measure in terms of fattening performance and carcass composition are not compensated for by the rather modest improvement in meat quality.
