**2. Fat replacers in processed meat products**

Most efforts in developing low-fat meat products to satisfy concerned consumers have been focused on reducing fat and/or substituting animal fats in the formula with plant oils. Fat is an important determinant for the sensory properties of meat and meat products, and thus a simple reduction of animal fat content in the formulation can lead to a product with poor sensory quality. Therefore, strategies to reduce animal fat while retaining traditional flavor and texture of meat products.

Juiciness and mouthfeel are very closely related to the fat content in meat products. To a large extent these sensory quality can be retained by using binders in low-fat and/or healthy meat products. Binders have been added to meat products for many years for both technological reasons and cost savings. Many binders with a number of different properties are available, but all those used in value-added meat products are to improve water binding capacity. Among the binders, carrageenan is the most widely used in meat industry. According to Varnam & Sutherland(1995), iota-carrageenan with calcium ions forms a syneresis-free, clear plastic gel with good resetting properties after shear. It is particularly recommended for use in low-fat products. Iota-carrageenan has very good water retention properties, and enhance cold solubility and freeze-thaw characteristics of processed products. The presence of NaCl in solution inhibits swelling of carrageenan but this difficulty can be solved by using NaCl encapsulated with partially hydrogenated vegetable oil such as olive oil, soya oil, corn oil and palm oil. Hydrogenated corn oils or palm oils are particularly effective in replacing beef fat. Soya oil emulsion is also effective at levels up to 25%, especially when used in conjunction with isolated soya proteins (Varnam & Sutherland, 1995).

Olive oil can be used in processed meat products an an oil-in-water emulsion form (Hoogencamp, 1989). Briefly, water is heated to 60-65°C. This water is homogenized with the isolated soy protein (42.15%, w/w) and the mixture is cooled to 5°C and then placed in a chilled cutter. After homogenizing for 1 min, olive oil is added while homogenization is

has a high biological value due to a favorable mix of predominantly MUFA and naturally occurring antioxidants including vitamin E, vitamin K, carotenoids and polyphenols such as hydroxytyrosol, tyrosol and oleuropein. Oleic acid makes up 92% of the MUFA in foods, and 60-80% of the oleic acid comes from olive oil (Pérez-Jiménez et al., 2007). Olive oil contains 56-87% monosaturated, 8-25% saturated and 3.6-21.5% polyunsaturated fatty acids (IOOC, 1984). The potential health benefits of olive oil include an improvement in lipoprotein profile, blood pressure, glucose metabolism and antithrombotic profile. It is also believed that olive oil has a positive influence in reducing inflammation and oxidative stress. Thus, intake of MUFA may protect against age-related cognitive decline and Alzheimer's disease. Olive oil is also reported to help prevent breast and colon cancer

This chapter discusses the effect of olive oil on the quality of emulsion-type sausage (Moon et al., 2008) and pork patty (Hur et al., 2008) when used as an animal fat replacer in the products. The grade of olive oil used were extra virgin olive oil(defined by the European

Most efforts in developing low-fat meat products to satisfy concerned consumers have been focused on reducing fat and/or substituting animal fats in the formula with plant oils. Fat is an important determinant for the sensory properties of meat and meat products, and thus a simple reduction of animal fat content in the formulation can lead to a product with poor sensory quality. Therefore, strategies to reduce animal fat while retaining traditional flavor

Juiciness and mouthfeel are very closely related to the fat content in meat products. To a large extent these sensory quality can be retained by using binders in low-fat and/or healthy meat products. Binders have been added to meat products for many years for both technological reasons and cost savings. Many binders with a number of different properties are available, but all those used in value-added meat products are to improve water binding capacity. Among the binders, carrageenan is the most widely used in meat industry. According to Varnam & Sutherland(1995), iota-carrageenan with calcium ions forms a syneresis-free, clear plastic gel with good resetting properties after shear. It is particularly recommended for use in low-fat products. Iota-carrageenan has very good water retention properties, and enhance cold solubility and freeze-thaw characteristics of processed products. The presence of NaCl in solution inhibits swelling of carrageenan but this difficulty can be solved by using NaCl encapsulated with partially hydrogenated vegetable oil such as olive oil, soya oil, corn oil and palm oil. Hydrogenated corn oils or palm oils are particularly effective in replacing beef fat. Soya oil emulsion is also effective at levels up to 25%, especially when used in conjunction with isolated soya proteins (Varnam &

Olive oil can be used in processed meat products an an oil-in-water emulsion form (Hoogencamp, 1989). Briefly, water is heated to 60-65°C. This water is homogenized with the isolated soy protein (42.15%, w/w) and the mixture is cooled to 5°C and then placed in a chilled cutter. After homogenizing for 1 min, olive oil is added while homogenization is

(Pérez-Jiménez et al., 2007, Waterman & Lockwood, 2007).

**2. Fat replacers in processed meat products** 

Union Commission reg. No. 1513/2001).

and texture of meat products.

Sutherland, 1995).

continued. Finally, the mixture is homogenized for additional 3 min and then used for manufacturing sausages and patties.

The incorporation of olive oil has been studied in fermented sausages (Bloukas et al., 1997; Kayaardi & Gök, 2003; Koutsopoulos et al., 2008) and beef patties (Hur et al, 2008). Partial replacement of animal fats with olive oil has also been tested (ranging between 3–10 g of olive oil per 100 g of product) in frankfurter sausages and low-fat products. Previous studies (Jiménez-Colmenero, 2007; López-López et al., 2009b) indicated that partial replacement of pork backfat with olive oil increased MUFA contents without significantly altering the n-6/n-3 ratio.
