PSVII-22 Effect of Trimming External Fat Before Cooking on Palatability and Calorie Content of Beef Ribeye Steaks

Abstract

Abstract Consumer concerns about excess dietary fat have increased the practice of removing external fat from beef steaks prior to cooking. This practice, however, may be detrimental to meat eating quality. The objective of this study was to determine the effects of removing the external fat before cooking on the eating quality and calorie content of ribeye steaks. Twenty longissimus thoracis muscles with Canada AAA (n = 10) and AA (n = 10) quality grades (equivalent to USDA Choice and Select, respectively) were obtained from a federally inspected commercial slaughter plant, vacuum packaged and transported under refrigerated conditions to the Lacombe Research and Development Centre (Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada). After an average of 28 d of ageing, the muscles were removed from the vacuum packaging and fabricated into four 2.54-cm steaks. One-half of the steaks were trimmed to 0.635 cm of external fat (cap on). The remaining steaks were completely trimmed of external and seam (kernel) fats (cap off), and the longissimus and spinalis dorsi muscles were combined with butcher’s twine. Steaks were cooked on an electric grill to an endpoint temperature of 74 °C. Subsequently, descriptive sensory analyses were performed by a 10-member trained meat evaluation panel and calorie analyses were conducted. Results: Compared with muscles of AA steaks cooked with cap off, the AA steaks cooked with cap on had longissimus with greater initial and sustained juiciness (P < 0.01) and a tendency towards a smaller proportion of panelists detecting livery off-flavor (P = 0.058) and mealy texture (P = 0.071), and spinalis with a tendency towards fewer panelists detecting unidentified off-flavors (P = 0.096) and spongy texture (P = 0.096). When cooking the AAA steaks with cap on, the longissimus had a decreased frequency of panelists detecting ‘other’ off-flavors (i.e., burnt, rancid, barnyard, stale; P < 0.05) and mushy texture (P < 0.05) and tended to have less off-flavor intensities (P = 0.083), whereas the spinalis had greater beef flavor intensity and desirability (P < 0.05) and fewer panelists tending to detect ‘other’ off-flavors (i.e., burnt, fatty, oily, rancid; P = 0.052), compared with steaks cooked with cap off. The more pronounced flavor effects in the spinalis compared with the longissimus of AAA steaks cooked with cap on could be due to the spinalis having greater endpoint temperatures than the longissimus muscles, which probably caused more Maillard reactions and more efficient fat melting. Regardless of the quality grade and muscle type, cooking steaks with cap on did not increase the calorie content (P > 0.10). Overall, cooking ribeye steaks with external fat had positive effects on juiciness, flavor and texture without increasing the calorie content compared with steaks cooked without external fat. Educating consumers on the benefits of maintaining the external fat while cooking will improve the eating experience of Canadian beef.