Superheated Steam as a Promising Pretreatment for Braised Pork: Enhancing Processing Yield, Texture Attributes, and Storage Stability

Quality deterioration during cooking and storage, particularly moisture loss, lipid oxidation, and microbial spoilage, remains a major challenge for braised pork. This study evaluated superheated steam (SHS; 180°C ± 2°C, 50 s, 25 kg h^-1) as a pretreatment alternative for braised pork and compared it with traditional blanching (BLA; boiling water, 2 min) in terms of processing quality during stewing, oxidative stability, and shelf-life estimation. Through a comprehensive quality assessment, the results revealed that SHS pretreatment significantly reduced cooking loss at 90 min (16.79% ± 0.54% vs. 20.21% ± 0.87% for BLA; p < 0.05), enhanced moisture retention, and improved color/texture attributes of braised pork. SHS also resulted in lower initial peroxide value (POV; 0.04 ± 0.01 vs. 0.07 ± 0.01 g 100 g^-1), thiobarbituric acid reactive substances (TBARS; 0.28 ± 0.02 vs. 0.45 ± 0.03 mg kg^-1), and protein carbonyl content (1.19 ± 0.10 vs. 1.60 ± 0.03 nmol mg^-1). During storage, SHS-treated samples exhibited significantly decelerated quality deterioration. Correlation analysis identified sensory scores as the most sensitive shelf-life indicator, remaining above the acceptability threshold significantly longer than the BLA controls. Specifically, SHS extended the estimated shelf life by 6 days at 4°C and 2 days at 25°C compared with BLA (9 and 6 days, respectively). Unlike previous work focused mainly on immediate effects of SHS treatment, this study followed quality changes through both stewing and storage. These findings suggest that SHS has potential as a pretreatment for improving the quality and shelf life of braised pork under the tested conditions, although further validation is required for broader application.