Comparison of Meat Quality Characteristics of Wet- and Dry-aging Pork Belly and Shoulder Blade

Abstract

The physicochemical characteristics and oxidative stability of wet-aged and dry-aged pork cuts were investigated at different aging periods (1, 7, 14 and 21 d). Samples were assigned into four groups in terms of shoulder blade-wet aging (SW), shoulder blade-dry aging (SD), belly-wet aging (BW), and belly-dry aging (BD). SD showed significantly higher pH at 21 d of aging than the other samples. Wet-aged cuts had significantly higher released water (RW) %, lightness (L*) and shear force compared to the dry-aged meats. Sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (SDS-PAGE) analysis showed greater degradation of proteins for dry-aged cuts than the wet-aged cuts. At the end of aging, wet-aged cuts showed significantly lower thiobarbituric acid-reactive substances (TBARS) value than the dry-aged samples, indicating higher oxidative stability for wet-aged pork cuts. However, dry-aging led to higher degradation of proteins resulting in increased water-holding capacity (WHC) and decreased shear force value.

Keywords: dry aging; dry-aged pork; pork aging; pork quality; wet aging.

Fig. 1. Shear force of different meat cuts at different aging time.

SW, shoulder cut wet-aging; SD, shoulder cut dry-aging; BW, belly cut wet-aging; BD, belly cut dry-aging; different letters in the bars indicate significant differences (p<0.05) of shear force among the samples.

Fig. 2. Sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (SDS-PAGE) patterns of pork muscle.

Lane-1, Molecular weight standard (M); Lane-2, 3 and 4 (W7, W14 and W21), wet-aged pork cut at day 7, 14 and 21, respectively; Lane-5, 6, and 7 (D7, D14 and D21), Dry-aged pork cut at day 7, 14 and 21, respectively.

Fig. 3. Thiobarbituric acid-reactive substances (TBARS) in different pork cuts during aging.

Different letters in bars among the samples in a particular aging day indicate significant differences (p<0.05).