Pre-dried mealworm larvae flour could partially replace lean meat in frankfurters: Effect of pre-drying methods and replacement ratios

Abstract

This study aimed to investigate the effect of replacing different amounts (5%, 10%, and 15%) of lean meat with yellow mealworm larvae (Tenebrio molitor L.) flour (YMLF) obtained via two different pre-drying methods on the quality profiles of hybrid frankfurters. With the increasing replacement ratio, the cooking loss of the freeze-dried YMLF (FD-YMLF) groups gradually increased, whereas those of the microwave drying YMLF (MD-YMLF) groups were always better than those of the control group (P < 0.05). Moreover, the MD-YMLF group showed superior textural properties than FD-YMLF group under the same replacement ratio (P < 0.05), especially for MD-YMLF-10% group. Additionly, with the increasing replacement ratio, the hybrid frankfurters had lower sensorial scores than standard frankfurters (P < 0.05), whereas the MD-YMLF group was always better than the FD-YMLF group for the same replacement ratio (P < 0.05). Our results indicated that MD-YMLF could be used as a potential lean meat replacement to process emulsified meat products.