Improved Tenderness of Restructured Beef Steaks by a Microbial Collagenase Derived from Vibrio B‐30

Abstract

ABSTRACT To reduce connective tissue toughness Vibrio B‐30 collagenase was evaluated for its ability to degrade muscle collagen in a restructured beef (RSB) product. Dissected muscles pooled from clods of 4 USDA choice chucks were made into three RSB products: untrimmed control (C), hand trimmed of epimysium (T) and untrimmed and treated with 0.01% collagenase (E). RSB products were held for 24 hr at either 2°C or 11°C and were analyzed cither raw or after heating (40°C for 1 hr). Aerobic microbial load remained low (1–2X10 2 cfu/g) during the 24 hr 11°C incubation. Heated samples of enzyme treated RSB had lower Lee‐Kramer shear values than controls. In both raw and heated samples enzyme treatment increased hydroxyproline solubility. An enzyme treatment of 24 hr at 11°C followed by heating produced maximum tenderization. Although optimum treatment conditions need to be defined by further research, Vibrio B‐30 collagenase appeared to be efficacious for the tenderization of RSB products.