Effect of processing and storage on the fatty acid composition of <i>n‐</i>3 or <i>n‐</i>6 fatty acid‐enriched eggs

Abstract

Summary Fresh eggs from hens fed diets supplemented with 4% linseed oil ( LO ) or sunflower oil ( SO ) were either directly submitted to pasteurisation, hard‐boiling or scrambling processing, or first submitted to refrigerated storage at 4 °C for 60 day and then to processing. Fresh LO eggs showed higher ( P ≤ 0.05) proportions of monounsaturated fatty acids ( MUFA s) and n ‐3 polyunsaturated fatty acids ( PUFA s), but lower ( P ≤ 0.05) proportions of saturated fatty acids ( SFA s), PUFA s and n ‐6 PUFA s than the SO eggs. Storage decreased ( P ≤ 0.05) the proportion of PUFA s and increased ( P ≤ 0.05) that of MUFA s in egg yolks from both treatments. The pasteurisation process had no effect on the fatty acid composition of fresh eggs from both treatments, but increased ( P ≤ 0.05) n ‐6 PUFA s and decreased ( P ≤ 0.05) n ‐3 PUFA s in stored LO eggs. Hard‐boiling and scrambling modified the fatty acid composition of fresh and stored eggs from both treatments by decreasing ( P ≤ 0.05) the proportion of PUFA s, particularly of the very long‐chain n ‐3 eicosapentaenoic, docosapentaenoic and docosahexaenoic PUFA s. LO eggs showed a higher susceptibility to fatty acid modification upon processing as compared to the SO eggs.