Use of histidine dipeptides and myoglobin to monitor adulteration of cooked beef with meat from other species

A new high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) method was used to monitor the adulteration of cooked beef products with meat from other species. The ratio of the histidine dipeptides anserine and carnosine which are present in skeletal muscle, are so different between sheep, cattle, horse and kangaroo that detection of adulteration can be rapidly achieved by chromatography on a Partisil-10 SCX column with 0.2 M lithium formate, pH 2.9. To obtain a definitive identification of the adulterant it was necessary to also examine the electrophoretic mobility of myoglobin in sodium dodecylsulphate gels. One brand of "beefsteak" pie was found to actually be a mixture of mutton and beef.