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Effective preservation techniques to prolong the shelf life of ready‐to‐eat oysters
Author(s) -
Costa Cristina,
Conte Amalia,
Del Nobile Matteo Alessandro
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
journal of the science of food and agriculture
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.782
H-Index - 142
eISSN - 1097-0010
pISSN - 0022-5142
DOI - 10.1002/jsfa.6605
Subject(s) - shelf life , modified atmosphere , sodium alginate , food science , coating , raw material , sodium acetate , food preservation , oyster , sodium , pulp and paper industry , chemistry , fishery , biology , engineering , chromatography , organic chemistry
BACKGROUND Oysters have a high commercial value but owing to their short shelf life are generally commercialized as raw material within very restricted market borders. A step‐by‐step optimization approach was used in this work to design ready‐to‐eat oyster packaging. In particular, six different steps were carried out in order to extend their shelf life. RESULTS The concentration of sodium alginate to realize a coating that was effective in terms of easy peeling and ability in preventing product dehydration was optimized. Coated oysters were packaged under different modified atmosphere ( MAP ) conditions to find the best MAP . Subsequently, to further promote product preservation, sodium acetate was selected as an effective antimicrobial agent to be applied by dipping treatment prior to coating. All preservation strategies singly tested were finally combined to assess the shelf life prolongation of ready‐to‐eat oysters. CONCLUSION Dipping in sodium acetate (10 g L −1 ), coating with sodium alginate (40 g L −1 ) and packaging under MAP (0:75 O 2 : CO 2 ) represent the best conditions to guarantee a significant shelf life extension to about 160 h compared with 57 h for unpackaged oysters. © 2014 Society of Chemical Industry