Abstract
Rabbit meat is a highly digestible, tasty, low-calorie food, often recommended by nutritionists over other meats. Currently research in the rabbit sector is interested in developing feeding strategies aiming to further increase the nutritional value of rabbit meat as a “functional food” by including n-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids (n-3 PUFA), conjugated linoleic acid (CLA), vitamins and antioxidants in rabbit diets and assessing their effects on both raw and stored/processed meat quality properties. Our recent studies indicate that the dietary inclusion from 3 to 6% of linseed might be considered as a way to achieve the enrichment of the meat with α-linolenic acid and to guarantee satisfactory product stability during further processing and storage. Considering that 6% dietary linseed corresponds to a n-3 PUFA content of 8.5% of the total fatty acids and a lipid content of 4.7 g/100 g of leg meat, a content of 396 mg n-3 PUFA/100g meat can be estimated, which represents about 19% of the recommended daily allowance (RDA) for n-3 PUFA.
Highlights
European rabbit meat production is approximately 500 thousand tons, corresponding to a 30% share of the world production
Considering that 6% dietary linseed determined a n-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA) content of 8.5% of the total fatty acids and a lipid content of 4.7 g/100g of leg meat, it can be estimated a content of 396 mg n-3 PUFA/100g meat which represents about 19% of recommended daily allowance (RDA) for n-3 PUFA by European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) [27] (Table 1)
In respect with the other groups, but only at the end of oxidation induction time [24]. Despite to these results, when a hamburger-type product was considered, the susceptibility to lipid oxidation was higher for L6 and L9 in comparison with L3 and control group which did not differ each other (Figure 3). Overall these results agree with the findings of an our previous study [23] which tested meat from rabbits fed on diets containing 0 or 8% linseed and indicate that lipid oxidation of the n-3 PUFA enriched meat becomes very critical especially when meat is further processed
Summary
European rabbit meat production is approximately 500 thousand tons, corresponding to a 30% share of the world production. The main problem associated with the modification of the natural fatty acid profile of muscle foods is determined by the ability of unsaturated fatty acids, especially those with more than two double bounds, to oxidise and reduce the shelf-life of meat products [7]. This problem could be more important when the meat with a high level of PUFA is used for further processing that involves mincing, long term frozen storage, and cooking [21]. For example, it has been suggested that dietary use of linseed could impair the flavour of cooked meat when the α-linolenic (C18:3 n-3) acid content of the meat is above 3% of total fatty acids [14,22]
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