Designing healthier comminuted meat products: Effect of dietary fibers on water distribution and texture of a fat-reduced meat model system

Development of healthier meat products is needed to meet consumers' request. The effects of dietary fiber addition on the water distribution, water binding capacity (WBC), and textural properties of a fat-reduced model meat system enriched with inulin, cellulose, carboxymethyl cellulose (CMC), chitosan, pectin, respectively, were investigated in this study. The fibers were incorporated in powder form to constitute 2% (w/w) of the meat batter. In general, fiber enrichment resulted in significant lower cooking loss and improved WBC, while the impact on texture was dependent on the specific dietary fiber. Low-field NMR relaxometry revealed that chitosan impacted the heating-induced changes in water distribution differently from other fibers and that CMC had a higher capability to counteract the impact of heat-induced protein denaturation on water expulsion than the other fiber types. It is anticipated that this knowledge is useful in the development of novel strategies where dietary fiber enrichment is optimized to promote specific and desired technological attributes of healthy meat products.