Stability of sous-vide cooked salmon loins processed by high pressure

Sous-vide cooking has become a popular procedure in restaurants. To assure optimal texture and flavours of salmon loins, restaurant chefs recommend using a maximal core temperature around 40 °C, which implies immediate consumption to avoid potential microbiological growth. High pressure processing (HPP) is a well known technology to decontaminate prepared food. This study proposes to evaluate the application of HPP to improve shelf life of such delicate products. Sous-vide cooked salmon loins were processed at 3 different pressures (210, 310 and 400 MPa) for 5 min at 10 °C. The microbiological stability (total viable counts and Enterobacteriaceae) of the products was checked during a storage period of 13 days at 4 °C. Texture, colour, pH and a hedonic sensorial analysis were conducted during this storage period. Results have shown that pressure above 310 MPa enables to extend shelf life up to 6 days. After that time, lipid oxidation and microbiological spoilage lead to product degradation.Industrial RelevanceSous-vide cooking is a common procedure in the catering industry where core temperatures are above 90 °C for most applications. In restaurants core temperature tends to be between 40 and 60 °C for fish and sea food implying that the product cannot be kept for more than 2 h in a refrigerated temperature before serving to avoid microbiological growth. HPP is proposed to pasteurize delicate sous-vide cooked products and use them as ready to eat meals.

Research Highlights
► High pressure processing is a well known technology to decontaminate food.
► Chefs use sous-vide cooking process with core temperature around 40 °C.
► Pressure above 310 MPa enables to extend shelf life of sous-vide cooked salmon loins.