NONACID MEAT DECONTAMINATION TECHNOLOGIES - MODEL STUDIES AND COMMERCIAL APPLICATIONS

Increased consumer awareness and concern about microbial foodborne dis eases has resulted in intensified efforts to reduce contamination of r aw meat, as evidenced by new meat and poultry inspection regulations b eing implemented in the United States. In addition to requiring operat ion of meat and poultry slaughtering and processing plants under the p rinciples of the hazard analysis critical control point (HACCP) system , the new regulations have established microbiological testing criteri a for Escherichia coli and Salmonella, as a means of evaluating plant performance. These developments have renewed and intensified interest in the development and commercial application of meat and poultry deco ntamination procedures. Technologies developed and evaluated for decon tamination include live animal cleaning/washing, chemical dehairing, c arcass knife-trimming to remove physical contaminants, steam/hot water -vacuuming for spot-cleaning/decontamination of carcasses, spray washi ng/rinsing of carcasses with water of low or high pressures and temper atures or chemical solutions, and exposure of carcass sides to pressur ized steam. Under appropriate conditions, the technologies applied to carcasses may reduce mean microbiological counts by approximately one- three log colony forming units (cfu)/cm(2), and some of them have been approved and are employed in commercial applications (i.e., steam-vac uuming; carcass spray-washing with water, chlorine, organic acid or tr isodium phosphate solutions; hot water deluging/spraying/rinsing, and pressurized steam). The contribution of these decontamination technolo gies to the enhancement of food safety will be determined over the lon g term, as surveillance data on microbial foodborne illness are collec ted. This review examines carcass decontamination technologies, other than organic acids, with emphasis placed on recent advances and commer cial applications. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.