The quality of fresh meat exposed for retail sale is initially judged on its appearance. The presence of exudate or'drip', which accumulates in the container of prepackaged meat or in trays or dishes of unwrapped meat, substantially reduces its sales appeal (Malton and James, 1983). Drip can be referred to by a number of different names including purge loss',press loss'and 'thaw loss'depending on the method of measurement and when it is measured. In general, beef tends to lose proportionately more drip than pork or lamb. Since most of the exudate comes from the cut ends of muscle fibres
The appearance of meat at its point of sale is the most important quality attribute governing its purchase. The ratio of fat to lean and the amount of marbled fat are important appearance factors and another is the colour of the meat. The changes in colour of the muscle and blood pigments (myoglobin and haemoglobin, respectively) determine the attractiveness
The increased application of temperature legislation in many countries. coupled with economic requirements to maximise throughput, minimise weight loss and operate refrigeration systems in the most efficient manner, has created a very large demand for process design data on all aspects of
Thawing has received much less attention in the literature than either chill- ing or freezing. In commercial practice there are relatively few controlled thawing systems. Frozen meat, as supplied to the industry, ranges in size and shape from complete hindquarters of beef to small breasts of lamb, although the major- ity of the material is 'boned-out' and packed in boxes ca. 15 cm thick weigh- ing between 20 and 40kg. Thawing is usually regarded as complete when the centre of the block or joint has
Theoretically, there are clear differences between the environmental con- ditions required for cooling, which is a heat removal/'temperature reduction process, and those required for storage where the aim is to maintain a set product temperature. However, in many air-based systems, cooling and storage take place in the same chamber and even where two separate facil- ities are used, in many cases not all the required heat is removed in the