Assessing the variability of the fatty acid profile and cholesterol content of meat sausages

• Autor(a) principal: Amaral, Joana S.
• Data de Publicação: 2014
• Outros Autores: Soares, Sónia, Mafra, Isabel, Oliveira, Beatriz
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: http://hdl.handle.net/10198/16216
• topic: Cholesterol; Fatty acid composition; Frankfurter sausages; Pork meat; Poultry meat

Eighteen different brands of meat sausages including pork, poultry and the mixture of both meats (pork and poultry) in sausages, were analysed for their nutritional composition (total fat, moisture, crude protein and ash), cholesterol content and fatty acid composition. As expected, the pork Frankfurter sausages presented a higher fat content compared to sausages that include poultry meat in their composition. A multivariate statistical analysis was applied to the data showing the existence of significant differences among samples. Regarding fatty acid composition, significant differences were verified in canonical variate plots when the samples were grouped by sausage type, suggesting that the fatty acid profile is strongly influenced by the type of meats, as well as other ingredients such as vegetable oil and lard, used in its formulation. The group of poultry Frankfurter sausages presented lower levels of SFA and higher levels of PUFA, which can point to a healthier profile compared to the pork and meat mixture sausages. Nevertheless, some poultry sausages showed a higher cholesterol content compared to the pork Frankfurters. The lowest mean cholesterol content was obtained for the group of pork Frankfurters, which somehow contradicts the consumers' idea that pork meat products should be avoided due to its high cholesterol levels.