Tenderness improvement in fresh or frozen/thawed beef steaks treated with hydrodynamic pressure processing

Tenderness improvement in fresh (F) or frozen/thawed (FT) beef steaks treated with hydrodynamic pressure processing (HDP) technology was examined. In Experiment 1, the effect of HDP and meat state at 48 h postmortem (fresh, never frozen compared to frozen at 48 h postmortem followed by thawing at 6 d postmortem) on meat tenderness at both day 1 and day 6 after HDP was evaluated. The effect of HDP was sustained throughout day 6 of aging.FT samples were 1 kg lower at day 1 compared to F samples and 0.8 kg lower at day 6. In Experiment 2, 40 boneless, rib-eye sections (5 d postmortem) were used. One control steak was cooked fresh, while a second was frozen for 60 d. HDP was performed on the 40 F rib-eye sections. Twenty of the HDP-treated rib eyes were frozen after HDP treatment. The remaining 20 F HDP-treated samples were cooked 24 h after treatment for tenderness determination. Sixty days after HDP treatment, the frozen control and HDP-treated samples were thawed and cooked. Control (never frozen) steaks prior to HDP treatment had shear values of 6.5 kg. A 29% reduction in shear force was observed for HDP-treated (F) samples. Freezing accounted for a 14% reduction in shear force. HDP treatment followed by freezing resulted in a 30% reduction in shear force compared to the frozen control samples.