Flavonoid‐Profiling Of Herbs And Spices As Functional Food Ingredient In Meat Products Using LC‐MS

The aim of this study was to evaluate commercially available plant extracts for their flavonoid content and their suitability as functional food ingredient in meat products. There has been increased interest in the use of plant extracts as functional ingredient in foods. Of particular interest are flavonoids, a group of polyphenolic compounds that are ubiquitous in plants. Recently, it has been shown that flavonoids can scavenge reactive nitrogen species and thereby prevent the endogenous formation of nitroso compounds. Furthermore, these compounds have antimicrobial properties and have been shown to protect colonic cells against nitrosamine‐induced damage in vitro. The endogenous formation of nitroso compounds has been identified by IARC as one of the potential mechanisms by which processed meat increases the risk of colorectal cancer. Because of their properties, flavonoid‐containing plant extracts are therefore an interesting functional ingredient for processed meat products. The tested plant extracts were added to 4 different meat products resulting in a total of 18 samples. Plant samples were extracted and analyzed before and after the addition to determine the composition changes after the meat production. The method was developed using an HPLC system with a reversed‐phase C18 column connected to a Waters Quattro Ultima triple quadrupole MS instrument; parameters for analysis were set using both negative and positive ion modes. The aim was to screen as many compounds as possible while also quantify a few key flavonoid compounds. The ESI source conditions were optimized by flow injection analysis using quercetin, quercetin‐3‐O‐rutinoside, (−)‐epicatechin, (−)‐epigallocatechin gallate, apigenin‐7‐O‐glucoside, taxifolin, isorhamnetin, luteolin‐glucoside, apigenin standards. We used different Multi Reaction Monitoring channels to identity and quantify flavonoids. Unknown analytes were identified by comparing their combined positive and negative ion mode fragmentation spectra with the respective literature data when commercial standards were not available. The flavonoid content and composition of plant extracts was evaluated before and after addition to different meat products. The limit of quantification was 40 nM for epigallocatechin‐3‐gallate and (−)‐epicatechin, and 100 nM for most other compounds. Our results showed that most flavonoids remained stable after addition to meat products and that there were no significant changes in quantitative and qualitative composition. Support or Funding Information This work was supported by an FP7 grant of the European Union, PHYTOME.