Author(s)

Sabrina da Costa Silva Andrade, Eliane Teixeira Mársico, Ronoel Luiz de Oliveira Godoy, Sidney Pacheco, Robson Maia Franco, Sérgio Borges Mano, Carlos Adam Conte-Junior

Department of Food Technology, UFF, Niterói, Brazil.
Embrapa Food Agroindustry, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
Graduation Program in Veterinary Hygiene and Technological Process of Products of Animal Origin, Fluminense Federal University, Niterói, Brazil.

The present study was conducted aiming at establishing chemical quality parameters to assess ice stored mullet (0℃ ± 1℃) through the evaluation of nucleotide (adenosine monophosphate [AMP], inosine [HxR] and hypoxanthine [Hx]) degradation, biogenic amine (histamine [HI], putrescine [PU], cadaverine [CA] and tyramine [TI]) quantification and mesophilic and psychrotrophic bacteria count monitoring. The microbial load of 7 log CFU·g^–1 established as maximum acceptable limit was attained after the 20th day of ice storage. IMP concentration declined during the storage period to levels below the detection limit. HxR content increased only up to time T3 and then declined. Hx level increased during all the storage period. CA and HI content increase was not observed, on the other hand, PU and TI contents significantly increased (p < 0.05) at time T5. We concluded that IMP and Hx concentrations can be adequate parameters to assess mullet quality under the study conditions. HxR proved to be adequate to evaluate the freshness of mullet in the first days of storage while the amines, PU and TI, can be used to assess loss of quality. Mullet obtained in conditions similar to those of the present study and maintained at 0℃ ± 1℃ can be consumed up to the 20^th storage day.

Quality Parameters, Biogenic Amines, Nucleotides, Hypoxanthine, Mugilidae

Andrade, S. , Mársico, E. , Godoy, R. , Pacheco, S. , Franco, R. , Mano, S. and Conte-Junior, C. (2014) Chemical Quality Indexes of Mullet (Mugil platanus) Stored on Ice. Food and Nutrition Sciences, 5, 1030-1039. doi: 10.4236/fns.2014.511114.