The potential of the mineral composition to discriminate between beef from different cattle diets and between individual muscles

Abstract

The effect of the diet of cattle on the mineral composition of various beef muscles was investigated. Both dietary treatment and muscle type influenced the mineral composition (Na, Mg, P, K, Ca, Mn, Fe, Ca, Zn and Se) of beef. The possibility of discriminating beef according to its dietary background and between muscle types was also investigated. Two canonical discriminant analysis models were developed and validated using the mineral concentrations in four muscles (supraspinatus, semitendinosus, longissimus lumborum and psoas major) from cattle reared completely on grass pasture, barley-based concentrate or grass silage with added concentrate combinations. The results demonstrate that the models could correctly classify grass-, partially grass- and concentrate-fed beef (accuracy = 80.7–94.9%) and the different muscles (accuracy = 81.4%). The discriminant models extracted characteristics of Irish grass-fed beef from the mineral composition and this has the potential for distinguishing grass-fed beef from beef raised on other diets.