Short communication. Sensory evaluation of commercial beef produced in Uruguay and three European countries

Abstract

The main goal of this study was to characterize and compare the organoleptic quality of beef from Uruguay and from three European countries. In Uruguay, 40 Hereford steers were raised exclusively under grazing conditions up to either two or three years old. Meat samples were aged for 20 days, matching commercial conditions. In Europe, one commercial local beef type, with two ageing times (7 and 20 days), from Germany, Spain and the United Kingdom were compared with Uruguayan beef samples, using 20 animals of each treatment per country. The highest beef odour and flavour scores were for the British beef aged for 7 days followed by the German and Uruguayan meat. Beef from the youngest animals (Spanish) and, especially from the UK, were up to 42 and 62%, respectively, more tender than German beef, all of them aged for 7 days. The highest juiciness scores were for the Uruguayan three years old beef. Long ageing periods (20 days) tended to produce off-aromas in the case of the British beef, which showed the highest scores in abnormal odour flavour intensities. European beef showed a significant variability in its sensory attributes that could not be justified only by differences in the ageing time. Uruguayan beef has meat with similar sensory characteristics to some European meats, and because of that it could have good consumer acceptability.