DETERMINATION OF NITRITES IN MEAT SYSTEMS - AN IMPROVED PROCEDURE

Various analytical methods for nitrite determination in meat products, based on extraction of the preservative through digestion at 60-80 de grees C followed by colorimetric analysis gave relatively poor recover ies (44-65%) when applied to raw beef. An improved procedure was deve loped based on disintegration and dispersion of beef with sand prior t o the extraction step and on the use of a higher concentration of N-(1 -naphthyl) ethylenediamine dihydrochloride than normally used. The pro posed technique resulted in almost 93% recovery of nitrites and showed a high precision revealed in a variation coefficient of similar to 8% . (C) 1996 Elsevier Science Ltd.