Optimization of microwave cooking of beef burgundy in terms of nutritional and organoleptic properties

- Traditional beef burgundy stew can be successfully cooked using a microwave method.
- Compared to traditional cooking way, microwaves do not increase CML formation in meat.
- Microwave heating preserves lysine more than conventional cooking.
- Cooking time using microwaves is reduced by 56% compared to traditional cooking.
- Microwave heating allows an energy saving of 28% compared to traditional cooking.

The premise was to adapt a conventional beef burgundy model for use in microwave cooking (MC) whilst preserving nutritional and eating qualities. The effects of specific power and different cooking times were measured by meat tenderness, Nε-carboxymethyllysine (CML), lysine, polyphenol contents and energy consumption. A CORICO (CORrelations ICOnography) design for four factors (specific power, times of browning, cooking and reduction) was used to compare MC and traditional cooking (TC) determining the optimized MC conditions. For the optimal conditions (specific power of 0.84 W/g and a cooking time of 84 min), the level of CML product was similar to that measured after TC. However, lysine degradation was more pronounced when TC was used compared to optimized MC. Consumer tests showed that the eating quality of the beef burgundy cooked using MC compared favourably to that of the TC. Energy consumption of the optimized MC conditions was lower than the conventional process (4.67 kWh vs 6.52 kWh) and the cooking time was decreased by 56% compared to TC.