Meat quality perception: Flavour

The flavour of a food is one of the principal factors involved in a consumer’s purchase decision; meat is no exception. Raw meat contains very little aroma. Raw meat aroma can be described as bloodlike or one that has a serumy taste.

Meat flavour derives from the combinations of taste sensations as well as other sensations that are influenced by consumer food perception, such as colour, mouthfeel, juiciness, texture, and aroma.

Flavour may be regarded as consisting of taste and smell. However, eating or sensory quality is only one dimension of consumer perceived quality.

Cooked meat flavour is the result of chemical reactions that occur within and between the lipid and lean portions of meat during cooking.

The aroma flavour characteristics of cooked meats are derived from volatile flavour components which derive from thermally induced reactions occurring during heating via the four pathways including
(1) Maillard reaction of amino acid or peptides with reducing sugars,
(2) Lipid oxidation,
(3) interaction between Maillard reaction products with lipid oxidized products and
(4) vitamin degradation during cooking.

The Maillard reaction helps to explain carbonyl and amine reactions. Normally, meat cooked at a high temperature shows browning because when a free amino acid links with a carbonyl group forming glycosylamine, and when the latter is dehydrated and rearranged, it produces furanone derivatives, furfural, dicarbonyl compounds, and hydroxyketones. These compounds add flavor to meat.
Meat quality perception: Flavour

Quality beef desired by consumers

Beef is graded on the basis of those characteristics that provide the best indication of its relative desirability to the consumer. Consumers desire the following qualities in beef:
Palatability. Palatability is influenced by the tenderness, juiciness and flavor of the fat and lean.

Attractiveness. The color of the lean, the degree of fatness and the marbling are leading factors in determining buyer appeal.

Moderate amount of fat. Fat finish and marbling were considered indicative to better eating quality. These factors affect the juiciness.

Tenderness. Consumers want fine grained, tender beef in contrast to coarse-grained, less tender meat. Pasture-fed beef is generally les tender and less desirable to consumers than beef from concentrate-finished cattle.

Pasture finishing cattle typically takes longer period of time and therefore results in greater age of the animal harvest which leads to decreased tenderness.

Small cuts

Repeatability. Housewife wants a cut of beef just like the one that she purchased last time, which calls for repeatability.

Ease of preparation.

Consumers who preferred Choice beef did so because of its advantages in palatability while those who preferred Select beef did so because of its advantages in leanness.

Higher quality beef products are desired in the hotel-restaurant and retail markets. Fast-food industry firms on the other hand, purchase lower quality beef products.
Quality beef desired by consumers

Consumer Perceptions of Meat Quality

Consumer Perceptions of Meat Quality
Sensory studies are frequently used to evaluate the quality of mea t and meat products. According to these studies, preferences for meat seem to be strongly affected by color/appearance and texture, and to a lesser extent by changes in flavour.

Texture may be understood with juiciness and tenderness as different dimensions of textural quality.

Flavor may be regarded as consisting of taste and smell. However, eating or sensory quality is only one dimension of consumer perceived quality.

Many consumer surveys in countries clearly demonstrate that consumers not only care about eating quality but also other quality attributes such as product safety, animal welfare, ecological production methods, or the presence of residues or additives such as hormones or antibiotics used in animal production.

There are two main approaches to investigating and modeling consumer behavior: the consumer studies/marketing approach and the microeconomic approach.

In the former, several models are available that seek to capture different aspects of consumer attitudes and behavior.

This approach regards the perception of quality linked to the personal goals and ends of each consumer. The means-end chain theory is a good example of this approach.

Consumers are assumed to choose products because they believe that’s specific attributes of the products can help them achieve desired ends.
Consumer Perceptions of Meat Quality