Meats+Group+6

MEAT

Wholesale Cuts of Meat (Beef)

**Chuck -**

Includes Chuck Blade Roasts and Pot Roasts, these cuts tend to be tougher but are more flavorful. Ways to cook them would include low temperature, slow cooking in broth. These would be good cuts to use for stews.

**Rib -**

Includes Back Ribs and Ribeye steaks, the ribeye is located near the center of the rib and is more tender and has more marbling. Prime rib also comes from this section and is generally slow roasted.

**Loin -**

Includes Porterhouse Steaks, T-Bone Steaks and Tenderloin Roasts and Steaks. The tenderloin is very moist and tender. These cuts can be grilled or broiled.

**Sirloin -**

Includes Top Sirloin Steaks and Tri-tip Roasts and Steaks. This section is considered reasonably tender although the tenderness is not as consistent as other cuts.

**Round -**

Includes Top Round Steaks, Sirloin Tip Center Roast. Most of the cuts from the round section are not tender as they are from muscles with less fat and muscles that the cow uses regularly.


 * Plate - **

Includes Skirt Steaks and meaty Short Ribs. These cuts are tough and are sometimes used for pastrami and ground beef. Skirt steaks are sometimes marinated for 6 or more hours then grilled to use in fajitas.


 * Flank - **

Includes Flank Steaks. These steaks can be tough and are sometimes used for ground beef.


 * Shank -**

The shank has meat segments that are very tough and frequently used in making broth and soup stock.

**Brisket -**

These cuts are basically the cow breast and are very tough. This section of the cow is very good for use in making pastrami and corned beef.

Watch Alton Brown take a look inside a cow and explore the different cuts of meat! Dont worry, its a plastic cow :) (11)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F7-_ka3DAuY

Watch Alton Brown talk about pork tenderloin in this video! (Fast forward to 1:30)(12)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h3vyEEmFT5Q

**Tough Meat verses Tender Meat**

The length of the muscle fiber determines how tough the cut of meat is. If the muscle is used a lot, like the shank and brisket cut areas, the meat will be especially tough. This is because the meat will have more connective tissue and less marbling because they are worked more. Whereas the back area of the cow is usually very tender because they have more marbling and less connective tissue. As the animal ages all the cuts of meat will get tougher. The cubed steak used in lab was tough and chewy. It did not taste as well as the other meats did because it might have had less marbling than the other meats. Marbling is fat and fat contributes to flavor.

Ways to artificially tenderize tougher cuts of meat (These are some of the ways that meat can be artifically tenderized, but the technique used during lab was mechanical tenderization.) Electrical Stimulation: It is when electrical impulses are used to tenderize meat. It is done after slaughter and before rigor mortis. This is caused by electricity converting ATP into lactic acid when electricity travels through the meat along with increased enzyme activity. This causes the meat to become more tender because the proteins denature in the meat. There is no way to tell if meat is electrically tenderizated. Since the cubed steak was already mechanically tenderizated, it is most likely that it was not electrically stimulated as well.

Mechanical: Cube steak is a perfect example of mechanically tenderized meat. A cut of top round or top sirloin is fiercely pounded using a meat mallet or using an electric tenderizer which pierce the meat in every direction. This breaks apart the muscle fibers and connective tissue to produce a more tender piece of meat. A common use for cube steak is making chicken fried steak. In the lab, the cubed steak was already mechanically tenderized before it was used. If the cubed steak was not already mechanically tenderized, using a meat hammer until the meat was slightly flatter could have been adequate.

Salts, enzymes and acids: These compounds help to denature proteins in the meat causing them to become more tender. Adding enzymes is usually done in the meat processing plant. Salt tenderization does add flavor to the meat, but it can raise the salt content, so people who are avoiding salt for health reasons should take caution, especially with processed meats. Adding acids is usually in the form of an acid sauce, like BBQ sauce, while cooking. It also helps to cut the meat to increase the surface area of the meat, therefore increasing the tenderization. Some examples of acids that can be used are acids from fruits, vinegar and wine. During the lab, orange zest was added to the cubed steak while cooking, which has some of the acid from the orange, which causes denaturation of the cubed steak proteins.

Cooking Meat

"When beef is cooked, it loses water and shrinks. Its pigments, which combine with oxygen, are denatured (broken into fragments) by the heat and turn brown, the natural color of well-done meat. At the same time, the fats in the beef are oxidized. Oxidized fats, whether formed in cooking or when the cooked meat is stored in the refrigerator, give cooked meat a characteristic warmed-over flavor. Cooking and storing meat under a blanket of antioxidants—catsup or a gravy made of tomatoes, peppers, and other vitamin C–rich vegetables—reduces the oxidation of fats and the intensity of warmed-over flavor. Meat reheated in a microwave oven also has less warmed-over flavor." (1)

Tougher cuts of meat such as the shank or chuck are best slow cooked in a liquid such as a broth or water as they will need more time to melt the tough connective tissue (collagen). They can also be sliced against the grain and used in stir-frys. More tender cuts such as the loin and sirloin can be grilled or broiled. Tougher cuts of meat need more time to cook, so they might be good for recipes that involve simmering, like a stew. Tender cuts of meat do not need as long to cook, unless the recipe does involve simmering for long periods of time at very low temperatures. A good example of this is when cooking ribs, which are tender cuts of meat, that can be simmered at low temperatures, which is covered in tin foil. The cubed steak in lab was not covered, so it was tougher than the other cuts of meats sampled in the lab, like the pork tenderloin.

The cubed steak was pan fried, much like in the picture below. Butter was melted before the steaks were added to prevent it from sticking to the pan. This cooking method is not good for tougher cuts of meat because they need more time and tenderization to become tender. This is why many techniques for tenderization were used on the cubed steak (mechanical, salt, orange zest, garlic.)

(Notice that the steaks in the chart decrease in size and redness as they are cooked for more time. This is because heating decreases the strength of the proteins to hold water in, causing the meat to become drier and smaller. The well done steak is browner than the red rare steak beccause some proteins contain the myoglobin that is response for the red color is lost when cooking. This had happened in the cubed steak recipe, where the steaks were red and more moist than the brown, slightly smaller cooked steaks.)

**What are some ways to make tough meat tender?**



There are various circumstances that affect how tender a piece of meat is (1). For example, the more connective tissue on a cut of meat, the more tender it is. The age of the collagen increases the tenderness, the age of the actual animal (younger animals typically have more tender meat) size of the muscle fiber, fat content, rigor mortis and how an animal is handled after it has been slaughtered all affect the tenderness of a cut. Some ways to make a piece of meat more tender would be to squish it, dry heat it, use enzymes, salts, marinate the meat (adding an acid) or take some aggression out and beat it with a hammer!

**Some useful tips for handling/preparing meat after it has been cooked:**

As we mentioned before, heating effects meat in many ways. It lets the meat become more flavorful, the meat shrinks as the proteins denature, etc. Well what about after the meat has been cooked? 1. Carving- Carving the proper way to carve meat. It is cutting the meat against the grain 2. Carry-over- Remember that meat is heated at a very high temperature in order to cook. Therefore, when it is taken off the heat it is still hot, essentially cooking for a short period of time. 3. Let it sit- Many cooks and "Clean Eating" Magazine (below) recommend that you allow your meat to "stand" prior to carving/cutting because the moisture that was released during cooking returns to the tissue making it more moist.  Grading meat (highest to lowest: Prime, Choice, Select and Standard) is not required by law. Grades can be subjective and many retailers <span style="font-family: 'Arial Black',Gadget,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">use their own grade. Do you think this could be a marketing tactic?

Prime is what is mostly sold in restaurants while choice and select are sold in supermarkets. This weeks circular for Big Y states that their Strip Steak USDA Choice is on sale for 4.99 lb. But who decided this piece of meat should be graded as Choice? They most likely did. A suggestion would be, Go to the supermarket that you know YOU like their meat, that you think has the most flavor, heavy/moderate marbling and buy your meat there. Because what one supermarket might put on sale as Choice may be another supermarkets Select. Go where your taste buds lead you! http://bigy.mywebgrocer.com/Circular.aspx?c=90138&n=1&s=137981832&g=6cbf590c-935d-4809-9bad-f7f01c7a2b60&uc=09E4253

<span style="color: #800000; font-family: Impact,Charcoal,sans-serif; font-size: 160%;">**References:** 1. [] 2. [] 3. [] (1) 4. [] 5. [] 6. <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Brown, Amy. 2011. Understanding Food: Principles & Preparation.Forth Edition. Chapter 7 <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">Pictures <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">7. [] <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">8. [] <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">9. [] 10. Clean Eating Magazine, April/May 2011, Issue 20 11. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F7-_ka3DAuY 12. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h3vyEEmFT5Q 13. http://bigy.mywebgrocer.com/Circular.aspx?c=90138&n=1&s=137981832&g=6cbf590c-935d-4809-9bad-f7f01c7a2b60&uc=09E4253 14. http://www.google.com/imgres?q=chikfila&hl=en&gbv=2&tbm=isch&tbnid=T-5PduLb7TsOeM:&imgrefurl=http://velonews.competitor.com/2011/04/news/alberto-contador-lands-new-personal-sponsorship_166289&ei=XcSdTdGmJsqjtge8mYDaBA&zoom=1&iact=hc&vpx=1027&vpy=125&dur=217&hovh=203&hovw=248&tx=154&ty=111&oei=XcSdTdGmJsqjtge8mYDaBA&page=1&tbnh=137&tbnw=166&start=0&ndsp=24&ved=1t:429,r:5,s:0&biw=1314&bih=780


 * Thought this was a cute cartoon for the fast food restaurant Chik-fil-A (Its only down south)**