Microwave as a rapid cooking method for beef tenderness evaluation

Semitendinosus (ST) muscle steaks were grouped according to three locations (proximal, middle, and distal end), grilled to endpoint temperature of 71C or cooked for 20, 30, 40, 50, or 60 s in a microwave oven (Mw). The location did not affect (p > .05) the cooking loss (CL) or shear force (SF) values. The CL increased (p < .05) with longer microwave cooking times, but only the Mw40 samples did not differ (p > .05) from the grill samples. None of the microwaves' SF values were different (p > .05) from the grill values, with treatments Mw30 to Mw50 showing moderate repeatability (R = 0.51-0.60) and Mw30 and Mw60 showing higher correlations (r > .71) with grill values. Cooking beef strips with a microwave is a potential method for tenderness evaluation, but requires additional study to evaluate and optimize this application in different muscles and for comparison to sensorial data.

The work was intended to evaluate the possibility of using a microwave oven for cooking meat to be used in objective measurement protocols for meat tenderness and to optimize the conditions for this purpose. The use of a standardized microwave procedure allows a dramatic reduction in analysis time and may reduce error variance due to nonuniform cooking procedures.