Comparison of Two Shearing Methods for Objective Tenderness Evaluation and Two Sampling Times for Physical-Characteristic Analyses of Early-Harvested Broiler Breast Meat

Fillets, pectoralis superficialis, were harvested from broiler carcasses immediately after picking (hot-boned), after chilling (chill-boned), or after 24 h of aging post-mortem (age-boned). In Experiment 1, shear-compression shear values were obtained from cooked left-side fillets and compared to Warner-Bratzler shear values obtained from cooked right-side fillets from the same carcasses. In Experiment 2, sarcomere length and pH were determined at the time of boning and were compared to respective values obtained after 24 h of aging. Even though data obtained using the two shear cells were highly correlated (r = .93) over the entire range of values observed, the correlation coefficients derived from data within individual boning times were much smaller and were accompanied by differences in the slopes of the regression lines. Variances associated with boning-time means and shear-method means were significantly different. The conclusion was that comparisons of shear values involving the use of different testing methodologies should only be attempted within narrow ranges of such values. Differences in pH and sarcomere length at the time of boning decreased with fillet aging. Variances associated with pH and sarcomere-length means as a function of the time of boning were quite variable and, in some cases, significantly different.