Meat quality characteristics of Infraspinatus, Triceps brachii, Longissimus thoraces, Biceps femoris, Semitendinosus, and Semimembranosus of bactrian (Camelus Bactrianus) camel muscles

Abstract

The objective of this study was to evaluate and compare quality characteristics of Infraspinatus (IS), Triceps brachii (TB), Longissimus thoraces (LT), Biceps femoris (BF), Semitendinosus (ST), and Semimembranosus (SM) muscles from nine Bactrian camel carcasses. Individual muscles were collected to measure color, expressed juice, cooking loss, pH, sarcomere length, shear force value, myofi brillar fragmentation index. The pH for the six muscles was monitored at 1, 2, 4, 8, 12, 24 and 48 hrs postmortem. The TB muscle had a signifi cantly (P<0.05) higher pH value than LT, ST and SM muscles. The range of variation in expressed juice between the six muscles was 37.10 cm2/g in LT muscle to 41.27 cm2/g in SM muscle. The LT muscle had signifi cantly lower cooking loss and shear force values than IS, ST, TB, SM and BF muscles. The LT muscle had signifi cantly higher L* values than TB, ST, SM and BF muscles. However, the LT muscle had a signifi cantly lower myofi brillar fragmentation index than the other muscles. This study indicated that meat quality characteristics varied among Bactrian camel muscle types and the knowledge of this variation allows for better marketing and processing of camel meat.