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Instrumental and sensorial tenderness of three muscles from Belgian Blue and Norwegian Red cattle was reported. Consumers who are optimistically evaluating ...
Meat Science 97 (2014) 310–315

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Meat Science journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/meatsci

Relationships between sensory evaluations of beef tenderness, shear force measurements and consumer characteristics Lynn Van Wezemael a,⁎, Stefaan De Smet b, Øydis Ueland c, Wim Verbeke a a b c

Department of Agricultural Economics, Ghent University, Coupure Links 653, B-9000 Ghent, Belgium Laboratory for Animal Nutrition and Animal Product Quality, Department of Animal Production, Ghent University, Proefhoevestraat 10, B-9090 Melle, Belgium Nofima, Osloveien 1, NO-1430 Ås, Norway

a r t i c l e

i n f o

Article history: Received 31 January 2013 Received in revised form 10 July 2013 Accepted 25 July 2013 Available online 2 August 2013 Keywords: Beef Consumer Shear force Tenderness Sensory

a b s t r a c t The supply of tender beef is an important challenge for the beef industry. Knowledge about the profile of consumers who are more optimistic or more accurate in their tenderness evaluations is important for product development and beef marketing purposes. Central location tests of beef steaks were performed in Norway and Belgium (n = 218). Instrumental and sensorial tenderness of three muscles from Belgian Blue and Norwegian Red cattle was reported. Consumers who are optimistically evaluating tenderness were found to be more often male, less food neophobic, more positive towards beef healthiness, and showed fewer concerns about beef safety. No clear profile emerged for consumers who assessed tenderness similar to shear force measurements, which suggests that tenderness is mainly evaluated subjectively. The results imply a window of opportunities in tenderness improvements, and allow targeting a market segment which is less critical towards beef tenderness. © 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction Tenderness is one of the most important factors in consumers' perception of meat quality, taste and satisfaction (Verbeke et al., 2010), together with flavour, juiciness, freshness, leanness, healthiness and nutritional value as intrinsic quality cues, and brands or labels referring to process characteristics or quality control as extrinsic quality cues (e.g. Banovic et al., 2009; Brunsø, Bredahl, Grunert, & Scholderer, 2005; Krystallis, Chryssochoidis, & Scholderer, 2007). Whereas before purchase, processrelated characteristics, healthiness, appearance and eating quality have similar weights in the formation of quality expectations, eating quality stands out as the most decisive criterion shaping quality experience, satisfaction or dissatisfaction and future purchase (Banovic et al., 2009; Grunert, Bredahl, & Brunsø, 2004). In order to provide consumers with a wider range of beef product choice, beef producers have diversified their market offerings from the traditional beef steak and roast to an increasing number of processed products, including marinated and tenderised beef products. Successful introduction of such new beef products in the market is, however, dependent on consumers' favourable perception and acceptance (Grunert, Verbeke, Kugler, Saeed, & Scholderer, 2011). Given the high variability of tenderness, the supply of tender beef is an important challenge for the beef industry (Eggen & Hocquette, 2004; ⁎ Corresponding author. Tel.: +32 9 264 59 25. E-mail addresses: [email protected] (L. Van Wezemael), [email protected] (S. De Smet), Oydis.Ueland@nofima.no (Ø. Ueland), [email protected] (W. Verbeke). 0309-1740/$ – see front matter © 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.meatsci.2013.07.029

Hocquette et al., 2014–in this issue). The high variability in instrumentally measured tenderness of beef muscles has mainly been linked to differences between breeds and differences in the presence of tendernessrelated traits among beef muscles (Hildrum et al., 2009; Rhee, Wheeler, Shackelford, & Koohmaraie, 2004), i.e. the amount and degree of crosslinking of connective tissue, the contractile state of the muscle, and the intramuscular fat content (Voges et al., 2007). Variability in sensory evaluations of beef tenderness has been linked to person- and environmentrelated factors such as the dining situation. Huffman et al. (1996) showed that tenderness explained most of the variation in overall palatability for consumers sampling loin steaks at a white table cloth restaurant, while flavour was more important for consumers sampling steaks at home. The results of this study also implied that consumers with higher income levels were more critical when evaluating beef tenderness (Huffman et al., 1996). Tenderness can be assessed by sensory methods, using untrained consumers or trained expert panels, or by instrumental methods (Destefanis, Brugiapaglia, Barge, & Dal Molin, 2008; Hildrum et al., 2009). The most widely used laboratory method to measure meat tenderness instrumentally is the Warner–Bratzler (WB) shear force determination. Although several studies have illustrated consumers ability to differentiate between beef cuts with different levels of tenderness (e.g. Boleman et al., 1997), correlations between shear force measurements and sensory evaluations of beef tenderness are highly variable (Destefanis et al., 2008). As a result, shear force values have been flagged as not providing reliable information concerning product acceptability or preferences among consumers (Destefanis et al., 2008).

L. Van Wezemael et al. / Meat Science 97 (2014) 310–315

The objective of this paper is twofold. Firstly, this study aims to profile untrained consumers who are relatively positive (or optimistic) in their sensory evaluations of beef tenderness. These consumers, who might thus be less critical towards beef tenderness, constitute a market segment that might be more open for new beef cuts and products with varying degrees of tenderness. Knowledge about their profile is valuable for product development and beef marketing purposes, since they can be expected to be more easily satisfied with current or new beef products because of their less-critical attitude. Alternatively, basing general product launch strategies on their evaluations entails the risk of overestimating the product's market potential. Secondly, this study aims to profile untrained consumers whose assessment of tenderness matches best with shear force measurements. Given the often weak link between instrumental measurements and sensory evaluations of tenderness (Powell, Nicholson, Huerta-Montauti, Miller, & Savell, 2011) it is relevant to investigate whether particular untrained consumers are better at detecting tender beef than others. Consumers with a flair for beef tenderness might be a promising market segment for specific tender beef products, and knowledge about their profile would allow targeting these consumers in beef marketing campaigns or involving them in the product development process. Furthermore, consumers who are better in detecting tenderness can be expected to be less easily satisfied with the high variability of tenderness in currently available beef products, with negative consequences with respect to repeat purchasing behaviour. A tenderness guarantee system (such as Meat Standards Australia Tenderness Guarantee Scheme (Watson, Gee, Polkinghorne, & Porter, 2008)) might therefore be higher valued by this group compared to consumers who are not equally good in evaluating tenderness in line with instrumental measurements.

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involvement with beef (Zaichkowsky, 1985), attitudes towards beef safety and beef healthiness (Almli, Van Wezemael, Verbeke, & Ueland, 2013), interest in the healthiness of food (Roininen, Lähteenmäki, & Tuorila, 1999), food neophobia (Pliner & Hobden, 1992), and food technology neophobia (Cox & Evans, 2008). These attitudes to food and beef were selected because they might associate with consumers' ability to assess beef quality and their evaluation of beef tenderness. Also consumption frequency of different beef products (beef steak, roast beef, beef burger, minced beef, and ready-meal with beef) during the 14 days preceding the survey was recorded. After completing the questionnaires on computers at the central testing location, three beef steak samples were served in balanced order. After tasting each sample, participants reported their sensory evaluation of the tenderness of the three beef steaks on a 9-point rating scale ranging from 1 (not at all tender) to 9 (very tender). 2.3. Warner–Bratzler shear force analysis WB shear force has been assessed using samples taken after preparation from the same muscles as tasted during the sensory evaluation. After preparation, the BB samples were vacuum packed and frozen until analysis. The NR samples were stored for 1–2 days at 2 °C. The samples were allowed to reach room temperature before WB measurements. From all samples, cores were removed parallel to the muscle fibre orientation. The maximum force (N) needed to shear each core was recorded, and was averaged to yield the WB shear force value per sample. In Belgium, 4 WB shear force values for each of the three types of muscles were obtained (equal to the number of animals in the sample), while in Norway 8 measures were recorded for M. Psoas major, 17 for M. Infraspinatus, and 6 for M. Semitendinosus.

2. Materials and methods 2.4. Data processing 2.1. Meat samples Beef muscles were obtained from Norwegian Red (NR) and doublemuscled Belgian Blue (BB) young bulls (18–24 months old) for preparation and presentations in Norway and Belgium, respectively. Muscles were selected from ten animals in Norway, and from four animals in Belgium. Three beef cuts were selected for this study: M. Psoas major, M. Infraspinatus, and marinated M. Semitendinosus. Muscles were cut from the carcasses two days post mortem and vacuum aged at 4 °C until cooking 14 days after slaughter. Preparation methods for the different beef muscles including content and application method of the marinade have been described in Van Wezemael et al. (2012). Briefly, samples were cooked in a dry oven set at 175 °C. The samples were taken out when the core temperature reached 70 °C for M. Psoas Major, M. Infraspinatus and 72 °C for M. Semitendinosus, corresponding to medium (71 °C) to well done (77 °C) steaks (National Cattlemen's Beef Association, 1998). 2.2. Sensory evaluation of beef tenderness Central location tests of beef steaks were organised with adult beef consumers in Ås, Norway (n = 110) and Deinze, Belgium (n = 108) during selected weekdays of January and February 2011. All participants consumed fresh beef at least once a month, and were recruited from untrained panels in the two countries. The samples were stratified on gender (50% females and 50% males) and age (50% aged 18–35 years and 50% aged 36–55 years) to account for possible differences in attitudes and experience between these groups. Before tasting, participants completed a questionnaire regarding their socio-demographic characteristics (gender, age, household composition, education, and occupation) and expectations regarding the three presented beef steaks. Detailed sample characteristics are reported in Van Wezemael et al. (2012). Furthermore, participants completed a number of questions related to: attitudes towards beef (Olsen, Scholderen, Brunsø, & Verbeke, 2007),

In order to profile consumers who are evaluating samples as more tender than the average value given by the total sample of consumers, a separate measure was developed. This measure compares individual sensory evaluations with the mean sensory evaluation value for each beef sample. Therefore, for each of the three muscles the mean sensory tenderness for each tasted sample was calculated, which was subtracted from each individual sensory evaluation value. Sensory evaluations deviating more than one unit from the zero mean (negatively or positively) were labelled as pessimistic or optimistic tenderness evaluations, respectively. Participants who evaluated at least two of the three tasted samples positively were defined as optimistic tenderness evaluators, while participants evaluating at least two samples negatively were labelled as pessimistic tenderness evaluators. Average evaluators evaluated two or three samples similar to the average tenderness evaluations, and participants evaluating the three samples all in a different way (pessimistically, average, and optimistically) were labelled as capricious evaluators. To profile consumers with a flair for assessing tenderness in line with WB shear force values, it was necessary to first define ‘correct tenderness assessments’, and to identify participants who made such correct assessments. Therefore, WB shear force values were categorised into five WB shear force categories (WB5) covering the complete range of WB shear force values of the Norwegian beef samples. Since the range of WB shear force values among the BB samples was too limited to discriminate between very tender and very tough samples, only data from the Norwegian participants was used as input for the profiling part of this paper. As research has shown that consumers can discriminate tenderness levels with a difference of at least 1 kg (9.81 N) (Miller et al., 1995), all WB5 categories had a range of 11 N (cut-off points 19-3041-52-63-74 N). These cut-off points corresponded with threshold values reported in previous studies, where 31.38 and 38.25 N were used as cut-off values for very tender and tender beef respectively (Belew, Brooks, McKenna, & Savell, 2003; Sullivan & Calkins, 2011).

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To relate the WB5 to sensory evaluations, the participants' tenderness assessments of the different beef muscles (originally measured on a 9-point scale) were recoded into five consumer rating categories (CRC5), ranging from 1 = very tender (original codes 8 and 9) to 5 = not tender at all (original codes 1 and 2). To investigate whether consumers assessed tenderness levels in accordance with WB shear force values, the numbers of samples being rated in adjacent tenderness categories in WB5 and CRC5 were counted. Consumer evaluations differing more than one category with shear force measurements (CRC5 N WB5 + 2 and CRC5 b WB5 − 2) were defined as incorrect assessments. Correct assessments were rated in the same or adjacent CRC5 and WB5 categories. Defining correct and incorrect assessments allowed identifying study participants who were better in evaluating the beef steaks in accordance with shear force measurements. Better evaluators were defined as participants assessing at least two of the three tasted beef samples correctly.

80 70

WB shear force (N)

312

60 50 40 30 20 10 0

2.5. Statistical data analysis Data were statistically analysed by means of the software package SPSS 19.0. Univariate descriptive statistics were used to map sensory evaluations and shear force measurements of the different beef cuts. Correlation between sensory assessments of tenderness and shear force measurements were reported by means of Pearson correlation coefficients. To profile different groups of participants, multivariate statistical analysis techniques were used (analysis of variance and chi-squared tests). Reported differences were significant at the 0.05 level. 3. Results and discussion 3.1. Sensory evaluations of beef tenderness Large differences existed between sensory evaluations of the tenderness of the beef samples in Belgium and Norway (Fig. 1). These results might reflect the subjective nature of consumers' tenderness evaluations. Concerning BB beef, all three presented beef cuts were rated as tender by the majority of the participants. M. Psoas major was rated as the most tender beef muscle, closely followed by the marinated M. Semitendinosus. This confirms earlier classifications of M. Psoas major as a tender beef cut (Sullivan & Calkins, 2011). Concerning NR beef, only the M. Psoas major was evaluated as tender by the majority of Norwegian participants. Marinated M. Semitendinosus was rated as the most tender of the treated samples, while M. Infraspinatus was rated as tough by more than 50% of the Norwegian participants. This was reflected by the WB shear force measurements which show a large variability particularly for M. Infraspinatus (Fig. 2) and may be an indication that the Norwegian participants were able to recognize and

Fig. 2. WB shear force measurements of the three different muscles of Belgian Blue (BB) (in grey) and Norwegian Red cattle (NR) (in black).

respond to tenderness in meat (see also Rødbotten et al., 2000). It is not unlikely that larger variability in the NR beef samples might easier allow discrimination. 3.2. WB shear force measurements Shear force values of NR beef cuts were higher and had a larger range compared to BB beef cuts (Fig. 2). This comparison should be interpreted with caution, because of the small sample size and slight methodological differences in WB shear force measurements such as the use of different instruments and freezing/thawing of the BB samples after preparation in contrast to the NR samples. The effect of freezing/ thawing before preparation on tenderness is minimal if samples have been aged sufficiently long (Leygonie, Britz, & Hoffman, 2012), which was the case in the present study. Freezing and thawing previously heated samples have even less impact on the meat structure so hardly any effect on WB shear force values is to be expected. Nevertheless, our data confirm earlier findings that meat from double muscled cattle is more tender compared to meat from other animals (see e.g. Clinquart, Hornick, Van Eenaeme, & Istasse, 1998; Ngapo et al., 2002). NR cattle has previously been reported to produce less tender meat than other cattle breeds, e.g. Holstein–Friesian cattle (Kirkland, Patterson, Keady, Moss, & Steen, 2007) and to display large between animal variability (Hildrum et al., 2009). 3.3. Sensory evaluations in comparison to mean consumer evaluations

NR M. Semitendinosus BB M. Semitendinosus 5 (not at all tender)

NR M. Psoas major

4

3

BB M. Psoas major

2

NR M. Infraspinatus

1 (very tender)

BB M. Infraspinatus 0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

Fig. 1. Sensory tenderness evaluations of the three muscles from Norwegian Red (NR) and Belgian Blue cattle (BB) assessed on a scale from 1 (very tender) to 5 (not at all tender) (recoded consumer rating categories).

For each of the tasted samples, about one third of the evaluations was defined as more optimistic about its tenderness than the average tenderness evaluation of the tasted sample (Table 1). Analysis of variance (Table 2) illustrated that optimistic tenderness evaluators had less concerns about beef safety issues, a more positive attitude towards beef healthiness, and were characterised by a lower degree of food neophobia. The results suggest that consumers' less critical evaluations of beef tenderness are correlated with a more positive attitude towards new food products in general. Food neophobia levels are highest among capricious tenderness evaluators. Furthermore, optimistic tenderness evaluators have more often younger children in their household compared to pessimistic tenderness evaluators. Pessimistic tenderness evaluators were profiled as less positive towards beef healthiness and more concerned about beef safety issues. Chi-square statistics revealed that

L. Van Wezemael et al. / Meat Science 97 (2014) 310–315 Table 1 Percentages of pessimistic, average, and optimistic tenderness evaluations per muscle type.

M. Psoas major M. Infraspinatus M. Semitendinosus

Pessimistic tenderness evaluation (b mean − 1) n = 303

Average tenderness evaluation (mean ± 1) n = 351

Optimistic tenderness evaluation (N mean + 1) n = 336

23.6 36.4 31.8

46.4 29.1 30.9

30.0 34.5 37.3

Note: a pessimistic/average/optimistic tenderness evaluation is defined as a sensory evaluation that is deviating one unit negatively/not/one unit positively from the mean tenderness evaluation of that particular sample of the beef muscle.

pessimistic tenderness evaluators are significantly more often female. Other socio-demographic characteristics such as education, occupation and income were not significanty different between evaluator groups.

3.4. Relationship between sensory evaluations and WB shear force measurements Table 3 shows the five WB shear force categories (WB5) and their characteristics. Hochberg GT post hoc tests showed that participants considered the beef cuts with lower WB shear force (WB5 categories 1 and 2) significantly more tender than the beef cuts that were assessed least tender by means of WB shear force analysis (Table 3). This indicates that the categories of consumer evaluations and shear force measurements are each meaningful for further analyses. Of all sensory evaluations of tenderness reported by the participants, 65.8% were in accordance with the instrumental results while 34.2% were incorrect assessments (Table 4). Percentages hardly differed between beef muscles. Participants who assessed at least two of the three beef cuts correctly (defined as better evaluators) accounted for 72.7% of the sample (Table 5). Pearson correlations between sensory evaluations of tenderness and WB shear force measurements are very small both in Norway and

Table 2 Profiles of pessimistic, average, optimistic, and capricious tenderness evaluators. Pessimistic tenderness evaluators n = 31 Attitudes towards beef healthiness⁎ Attitudes towards beef⁎ Involvement with beef⁎ Attitudes towards beef safety ⁎ General health interest⁎ Food neophobia⁎2 Food technology neophobia⁎ Number of adults in household Number of children in household Age youngest child years) Age (years) Beef consumption frequency1 Beef steak1 Roast beef1 Beef burger1 Minced beef1 Ready meal with beef1

Average tenderness evaluators n = 31

Optimistic tenderness evaluators n = 35

Capricious tenderness evaluators n = 13

4.33a

4.64ab

5.10 b

4.80ab

3.11 4.23 2.94b 4.79 2.49b 3.77 2.45 0.87

2.95 4.32 2.77ab 4.06 2.55b 3.64 3.58 0.68

2.74 4.38 2.33a 3.99 2.03a 3.52 2.63 1.09

2.96 3.87 2.50ab 4.20 3.09c 3.67 2.31 0.92

10.94b 37.32 6.29 0.65 0.48 0.68 3.29 1.19

10.33ab 36.06 7.13 0.87 0.45 0.74 3.35 1.71

7.68a 35.06 5.97 0.89 0.37 0.80 3.03 0.89

10.00ab 34.62 6.30 0.62 0.46 1.00 2.92 1.31

⁎ Assessed on a multi-item 7-point interval rating scale. 1 Consumption frequency in the 14 days preceding the survey. 2 In case of unequal variances significant differences based on Welch statistic are reported. ab Significant differences at the 0.05 level between tenderness categories using one way ANOVA and Hochberg GT's post hoc test.

313

Table 3 Characteristics of the five objective tenderness categories (WB5). WB5

WB range (N)

n

Mean WB shear force (N)

Sensory evaluations1 (mean tenderness rating)

1 2 3 4 5

19–29.99 30–40.99 41–51.99 52–62.99 63–73.99

56 104 88 71 11

25.68 36.60 45.99 56.97 66.55

6.04a 6.08a 5.16ab 5.28ab 4.18b

Note: WB5 = five WB shear force categories, WB = Warner–Bratzler shear force, N = Newton. 1 Sensory evaluations on the original tenderness scale ranging from 1 (not at all tender) to 9 (very tender). ab Significant differences at the 0.05 level between tenderness categories using one way ANOVA and Hochberg GT's post hoc test.

Belgium (Table 6), and only in the case of the marinated M. Semitendinosus WB shear force values were significantly correlated to sensory tenderness evaluations. Although correlations of WB shear force with sensory assessment of beef tenderness are highly variable, the correlations found in our study are low compared to some studies (Destefanis et al., 2008). However, our results confirm the findings of Powell et al. (2011) who reported that consumers' rating of beef muscle tenderness appeared to be independent of WB shear force values. Possibly the low experience of the participants with assessing meat tenderness, or the wide variety in presented meat cuts has influenced sensory evaluations in our study. The doneness of the tasted steaks might be another influencing factor, since rare and medium rare steaks are perceived as more tender compared to the medium and well done steaks that were used in this study (Schmidt et al., 2010). Also other sensory attributes relating to texture and juiciness may influence evaluations of tenderness and thus might lead to the low correlation. The difference in shear force values between breeds and beef cuts was not reflected in the sensory evaluations. For all presented beef cuts in both countries, study participants used the whole range of the sensory evaluation scale for tenderness, which is remarkable given the large differences in shear force values between breeds and cuts (Fig. 2). Our results indicate that consumer experiences with beef tenderness are strongly subjective, confirming qualitative research results suggesting that not all consumers prefer the same degree of tenderness (Verbeke et al., 2010). Beef consumers appear to evaluate beef tenderness using their own frame of reference that could be based on former consumption experiences, personal preferences, habits, social influences or available information. Given this subjective frame of reference, it is not surprising that correlations of sensory evaluations with instrumental measures of tenderness were low. 3.5. Profile of Norwegian consumers evaluating beef tenderness in accordance with WB shear force measurements Out of 330 tasted NR beef samples, 217 samples were assessed similarly in terms of WB shear force measurement categories and consumer rating categories. Among the 110 Norwegian study participants, 80 individuals evaluated tenderness similar to the WB shear force measurements for at least two of the presented beef cuts (defined as better

Table 4 Percentages of correct and incorrect assessments per muscle type.

M. Psoas major (n = 110) M. Semitendinosus (n = 110) M. Infraspinatus (n = 110) Total (n = 330)

Correct assessments

Incorrect assessments

67.3 61.8 68.2 65.8

32.7 38.2 31.8 34.2

Note: a ‘correct’ assessment is defined as a sensory evaluation rated in similar or adjacent tenderness categories compared to WB shear force categories.

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Table 5 Number of better and worse tenderness evaluators (n = 110).

Worse evaluators Better evaluators

0 correct assessments 1 correct assessment 2 correct assessments 3 correct assessments

Table 7 Profiles of better and worse evaluators of beef tenderness (n = 110).

Frequency

Percent

8 22 45 35

7.3 20.0 40.9 31.8

Note: a ‘correct’ assessment is defined as a sensory evaluation rated in similar or adjacent tenderness categories compared to WB shear force categories.

evaluators). Attitudes towards food and beef, and consumption frequencies of the two consumer groups evaluating sensory tenderness better and worse according to instrumentally measured tenderness are shown in Table 7. Analysis of variance indicated that none of the differences between the profiles of the two groups of evaluators were significant at the 0.05 level. However, at the 0.1 level a tendency was seen among better tenderness evaluators to have more positive attitudes towards beef healthiness and a higher consumption of ready meals with beef. Chisquare statistics revealed no significant differences between evaluator groups regarding socio-demographic characteristics such as gender, education, occupation and income. The results indicated that neither attitudes towards food and beef nor socio-demographic characteristics provide information that can be used to assess the quality of meat tenderness evaluators a priori. 4. Conclusions This study investigated tenderness of different beef muscles from two European cattle species. The large variability in WB shear force values between breeds and within Norwegian Red beef muscles shows a window of opportunity for especially the Norwegian beef producers to improve tenderness and provide more consistently tender beef cuts to the consumers. Sensory evaluations of beef tenderness appeared to be highly subjective and were only marginally correlated with instrumental measurements. Based on the results of our study, it can be concluded that WB shear force measurements have low predictive value with respect to consumer evaluations of tenderness, and by implication also with respect to consumer satisfaction and likelihood of repeat purchase. Norwegian beef consumers who are more optimistically evaluating beef tenderness compared to the average tenderness evaluation of the total consumer sample were found to be more often male, more open towards new food products, less concerned about beef safety and more positive towards beef healthiness. Knowledge about these optimistic tenderness evaluators allows a better targeting of marketing campaigns to position tender beef products in the national market. On the one hand, their expectations with respect to beef tenderness may be more easily met, but on the other hand, their optimistic evaluation should not be used as the sole decision criteria for estimating a beef products potential success in the overall marketplace. Furthermore, this study aimed to profile untrained consumers whose assessment of tenderness matches best with shear force measurements. Our findings showed that within the untrained Norwegian consumer sample, it was not possible to profile such consumers based on attitudinal and socio-demographic factors. The findings of this study (within Table 6 Pearson correlations between shear force measurements and consumer evaluations of three beef muscles of Belgian Blue (BB) and Norwegian Red cattle (NR).

M. Psoas major M. Infraspinatus M. Semitendinosus a

BB n = 108

NR n = 110

0.09 −0.04 −0.23a

0.06 −0.12 −0.28a

Correlation is significant at the 0.05 level (2-tailed).

Attitudes towards beef healthiness Attitudes towards beef Involvement with beef Attitudes towards beef safety General health interest Food neophobia Food technology neophobia Number of adults in household Number of children in household Age youngest child years) Age (years) Beef consumption frequency Beef steak1 Roast beef1 Beef burger1 Minced beef1 Ready meal with beef1 1 2 a

Better evaluators n = 80

Worse evaluators n = 30

F-value

4.84 2.93 4.24 2.70 4.21 2.38 3.68 2.88 0.84 9.57 34.99 6.75 0.86 0.40 0.78 3.33 1.39

4.39 2.92 4.32 2.51 4.38 2.56 3.53 2.63 1.03 9.78 38.43 5.57 0.57 0.53 0.77 2.80 0.90

2.94a 0.01 0.01 0.89 0.46 0.75 0.46 0.09 0.84 0.03 1.89 2.64 2.37 0.41 0.01 1.83 3.112a

Consumption frequency in the 14 days preceding the survey. Welch test statistic is reported in case of unequal variances. Differences are significant at the 0.1 level.

the boundaries of its limitations) possibly question a number of currently applied practices in research and industry, such as the use of WB shear force measurements to determine beef tenderness. Although shear force measurements, trained taste panels, and tenderness guarantee systems can yield valuable information to deliver meat that is considered tender by the ‘average’ meat consumer (which is per definition non-existing), our results suggest that it is very hard to guarantee tenderness for the total highly-diverse consumer population. This study has a number of limitations that can inspire future research. Firstly, WB shear force measurements were conducted in two different laboratories in Belgium and in Norway with a limited number of samples from different cattle breeds. Although preparation methods have been standardized in this study, differences in tenderness might partly be related to differences in shear force devices and protocols. Furthermore, the small sample size, especially in Belgium, does not allow drawing firm conclusions from the shear force measurements. Secondly, this study might simply not have used the most appropriate variables to profile better tenderness evaluators. Besides classical sociodemographics and attitudinal variables included in our study, other personal difference variables like motivations, habits, or the quality of previous experiences with beef steak, as well as environmental variables like company, moment and situation, may play a role. More research is recommended to get insight into the personal subjective reference frame that consumers use to evaluate tenderness. Finally, the limited sample size of the untrained consumer sample does not allow extrapolating the results beyond the characteristics of the samples included. Future research could investigate sensory and instrumental evaluations of beef tenderness using larger consumer samples in other countries, with higher beef consumption levels and different consumption practices and habits.

Acknowledgements This work has been performed within the EU FP6 Integrated Project ProSafeBeef, contract no. FOOD-CT-2006-36241. The financing of the work by the European Union is gratefully acknowledged. S. Lescouhier and Anne Segtnan are gratefully acknowledged for their skillful technical assistance. The referees and the journal editor are gratefully acknowledged for their valuable comments and suggestions on earlier drafts of this article.

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