Predicting cooked beef consumer liking and sensory freshness using rapid evaporative ion spectrometry

Meat plays an important role in ready meals; however, the quality of ready meals deteriorates with storage time, and food loses its freshness condition due to various biochemical changes. The freshness perception of cooked meat leads to a higher consumer acceptability which directly influences consumers’ food choice and define the purchase of chilled ready meals. Therefore, predicting the eating quality and freshness of cooked meat is important for the ready meals industry. The objective of this study is to evaluate the use of Rapid Evaporative Ionization Mass Spectrometry (REIMS) to predict consumer liking and freshness rating of cooked beef stored at 4oC for 9 days. REIMS enables real-time evaluation of several complex features from a single measurement [1].