Modelling the cooking doneness via integrating sensory evaluation and kinetics

•A general method for modelling the cooking doneness was developed via integrating sensory evaluation and kinetics based on M value.•During cooking process, the quality changes of meat based on sensory evaluation are agreed with the first-order reaction kinetic model.•'Half-thickness bonding method' was put forward to find meat's geometric center rapidly and accurately.

The aim of the current work was to develop a novel method to model and quantitatively determine cooking doneness via integrating sensory evaluation and kinetics based on the maturity value (M value) which was redefined. The well-done food was first selected from a series of samples with different M values by sensory evaluation, the average termination maturity values (AMT values) were obtained in accordance with the weighted M values of the selected doneness samples. Among, the changes of M values were assumed to be accorded with the first-order reaction kinetic model and a specific zM value was set as well. The zM value was then obtained due to the rationality of the hypothesis, which was validated by rigorous data analysis. Results showed that maturity time values (MT values) were existing and stable for specific types of materials and a specific population. Quantitative determination of the degree of doneness has profound significance in industrial production.

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