A few evenings ago, I was consulted by a friend of mine about the color of meat and how to tell if it'due south bad. She sent me this photo….

Dark MeatBack story… this woman bought these steaks, opened them up, turned them over, and found this…. She assumed they were bad and threw them out! She then went alee to post the photo on Facebook with a annotate about how upset she was her steaks were bad. Although I don't know this adult female, I wish I would take been able to let this adult female know her steaks were perfectly fine. And it makes me sad that nobody on those xx comments told her that either.

Huh!? Brown meat!? That's right. Brown meat is OKAY to eat.. So what makes meat red in the start identify? The most common answer people give me is claret. Well I hate to pause it to y'all but there is actually no claret in muscles. All the blood is removed from the animal when information technology is slaughtered. That cherry-red liquid you lot see is actually water mixing with a poly peptide that gives meat its red color, myoglobin. Myoglobin is a protein that stores oxygen for aerobic metabolism in the muscle. All mammals comprise this poly peptide in their meat tissues and is very similar to hemoglobin which stores oxygen in our ruby-red blood cells. This protein is normally a dark grayish-purple but when information technology comes in contact with oxygen, it becomesoxymyoglobin and reacts by turning a deep ruddy color. That is why most of the meat we meet has a bright cerise color.

But this color can vary, equally we have seen before, from calorie-free red to an intense scarlet to an almost royal color. Color in meat tin can alter depending on the age of the animal, the species, sexual practice, diet, and even the exercise it gets. The meat from older animals will be darker in color because the myoglobin level increases with as animals historic period. Exercised muscles are e'er darker in color. Considering muscles differ greatly in activity, their oxygen need varies which in plough means the same animal tin take variations of color in its muscles. Likewise myoglobin levels vary by species which is why beef has more of a red colour than pork or lamb.  So why does meat plough chocolate-brown?

Both myoglobin and oxymyoglobin have the ability to lose their oxidation which results in a dark-brown colour chosen metmyoglobin. This essentially means that meat can turn from a bright red color (which many acquaintance with fresh) to a brown color from a lack of oxygen. Meat can also turn brown if any sort of contagion that would cause a chemical reaction comes in contact with information technology. For example, cure (sodium nitrite) turns raw meat a brown-grey color (call back of a cured, uncooked salami) if it comes in straight contact with a meat surface, but if that same meat is then heated, the sodium nitrite turns the meat a pinkish color (much similar ham). In order for meat to maintain that bright blood-red color we are familiar with, oxygen must be available at a sufficient concentration. That is why grocery stores utilize a minor picture show over their products versus a vacuum package. Browning of meat tin can besides occur with meat that has been chilled for a long period of fourth dimension (nearly five days), ie: taken home from the grocery store and placed in your fridge for some fourth dimension. This happens considering equally meat is chilled/frozen for long periods of fourth dimension, enzyme activeness decreases so the myoglobin and oxygen quit mixing together to go along meat that vivid red colour.

Browning of meat tin likewise occur when oxygen partial pressure is depression or basically when meat is stacked on peak of 1 some other. This is more than likely the example from the photograph above. This is also the reason why your footing beefiness from the store may be red on the outside only brown on the inside. Oxygen can't readily brand its fashion through or penetrate the basis beef so it begins to lose its red colour on the inside after time. The changing from cherry to brown and even the purplish color to red occurs quite easily in meat, the reverse is much difficult. Once meat has browned, information technology is hard to get it enough oxygen to opposite the procedure. Also, this same procedure is the reason meat does indeed plow chocolate-brown when you cook it. But in one case meat is cooked, it denatures the proteins so there is really no going back! All of the protein is not affected at the aforementioned time which is why you become different variations of a blood-red color at different temperature points. Basically this is what gives the states rare, medium rare, medium, well done, etc. Those colors associated with meat temperatures are basically denatured metmyoglobin!

Then nosotros've established one time meat turns brown, it's hard for it to plough back to that red color. I myth I see commonly brought upwardly is that onetime meat is dyed red. This is not anything any of us in the meat industry have heard of nor have we constitute information to supply this then-called practice. Since nosotros are dealing with an enzymatic reaction here, I don't think any dye could possibly piece of work equally effectively every bit the reaction itself. When y'all see red meat in the grocery shop, information technology'south considering it is a. actually fresh  and b. allowed oxygen to go on it that red color.

Then if color isn't an indicator of spoiled meat, what is…? The number 1 indicator of spoiled meat is in fact aroma. An off scent will exist prevalent to your senses and the near constructive style to diagnose spoiled meat. Another indicator of spoiled meat is tacky or viscid to the impact. Slimy meat (not juicy) is also a great indicator of spoilage. This especially occurs if meat has been temperature abused. Raw meat that has been heated upwardly (non cooked) and so re-cooled will often times go sticky or tacky along with possibly a color alter. Use these three factors in diagnosing spoiled meat: does it smell, is it viscid, AND does it have color modify? If all three or at to the lowest degree ii of 3 are present (even with NO color change) than it'southward probably alright to toss it rather than gamble getting sick.

And then if you happen to open a package of meat looking like the photograph higher up, please don't throw it away only because of its color. Utilize the three indicators given to diagnose if it'south spoiled or not. If it is not spoiled, feel gratuitous to indulge without worry!

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For more information on this topic, visit these sources:

The Colour of Meat & Poultry from USDA

Meat Color from University of Saskatchewan

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