Food Science
Mixes for manufacture of cooked ham were formulated from pork (55–62%), mechanically recovered chicken meat (MRCM; 8–15%), 2.91% salts and 27.09% water. A D-optimum experimental design with contents of pork and MRCM as the 2 independent variables was used; content of pork + MRCM was constant at 70%. Cooked hams were prepared by traditional methods of the Cuban meat industry, and filled into either fibrous tripe or impermeable casings. Cooking losses, texture profiles and sensory properties were determined and results were correlated using the Design Expert Analysis program. Sensory quality of all the hams was rated as good or very good by a 15-member trained panel. For hams cased in tripe, quadratic equations were derived correlating (P < 0.05) sensory measurement of texture (r2 = 0.84), hardness (r2 = 0.83) and chewiness (r2 = 0.9) separately with pork and MRCM contents. It was concluded that good quality cooked ham could be manufactured with 15% of the pork replaced by MRCM. Yield was 100% of that of ham made from pork only.
