Effect of herbal powder supplementations on the meat quality of Noi chickens

Le Thi Thuy Hang^1,2 and Nguyen Tuyet Giang^1,2

¹ An Giang University, An Giang, Vietnam
ltthang@agu.edu.vn
² Vietnam National University Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

Abstract

The study investigated the effect of mixed herb powder (combination of garlic, lemongrass and turmeric) in the diet on the quality of breast meat of Noi chickens. A total of 240 Noi chickens were randomly distributed into 5 dietary treatments, including HM, HM25, HM50, HM75 and HM100 (equivalent to 5 levels of mixed herb 0, 0.25, 0.5, 0.75 and 1.0% in the diet). The treatments were replicated 3 times with 16 chickens each. The physicochemical characteristics were evaluated. The pH values and CIELab colour coordinates of Pectorales major muscle were also tested during 72h under refrigerator condition. The results showed that the supplementation of herbal mixture, particularly at the level of 1% in the diet, significantly reduced the cooking loss (21.8%) but increased the crude protein content (24.5%) and caloric value (108 kcal/100g) of chicken breast meat. The values of pH and surface color measured at 0h, 24h, 48h and 72h postmortem varied within the normal range of the chicken breast meat. Under cold storage condition (2-4^oC), the pH values declined during the first 24h then gradually increased until 72h. The lightness and yellowness of breast meat significantly increased, whereas the redness decreased in all groups. Treatments with mixed herb showed significantly higher values (p<0.05) in yellowness and pH, respectively observed on the meat surface at 0h and 72h postmortem.

Keywords: colour, Noi chicken, meat quality, herbal mixture, storage

Introduction

The global meat demand, as a result of gradual population growth, is forecasted to grow rapidly, reaching nine billion by the year 2050. However, in the second half of the 21^stcentury, the demand might fall due to limited natural resources and environmental constraints. Despite uncertain growth, the consumption of meat and other animal source foods could help reduce malnutrition and improve human health (Bodirsky et al 2015; Parlasca et al 2022). Over the last decades, consumers, with increasing health perception, are becoming more aware of the quality of the products they purchase. Chicken meat is an excellent candidate to meet this demand because of their outstanding nutrient content and relatively low energetic value (Mir et al 2017; Kralik et al 2018; Petracci et al 2022).

From the biodiversity perspective, native chicken breeds are receiving increasing amounts of consumer interest, not only in Vietnam but also in other countries worldwide (Jaturasithaet al2016; Birhanu et al 2021; Bongiorno et al 2022). Attractive appearance of native chicken is carcass, meat texture (tenderness), and appearance (colour) of skin or meat which might be related to chicken genotypes, diets, rearing systems and processing conditions (Wattanachant 2008; Jaturasitha et al 2016). Noi chicken, a native and famous poultry breed in the Mekong delta of Vietnam, was characterized by colourful feathers, skin and shanks, good meat quality and high disease resistance (Nguyen et al 2022a). As a indigenous breed, growth rate and carcass performance of Noi chicken might be affected by numbers of factors, such as sex, rearing systems, nutrition and storage conditions (Nguyen et al 2020; Nguyen et al 2023).

Former observations also highlighted the variation in physicochemical attributes of Noi chicken meat due to supplementation of green onion and garlic aqueous extracts in drinking water (Nguyen et al 2022b). Most of the studies have reported individual effectsof herbal plants in broiler chickens and there is limited information about the influence of a combination of herbs on Noi chickens. This study, therefore, was aimed to evaluate the physicochemical traits of breast meat derived from Noi chickens fed levels of the combination garlic - lemongrass - turmeric powder, particulaly the change in meat colour during storage.

Materials and methods

Animal and experimental design

The experiment was conducted from February to April 2022, on an experimental farm in Long Xuyen city, An Giang province, Vietnam. A total of 240 Noi chickens at 28 days old with similar initial body weights were randomly assigned to 5 dietary treatments based on the supplementation of mixed herb powder (1 garlic: 1 lemongrass: 1 turmeric): HM, HM25, HM50, HM75 and HM100, which were equivalent to 5 levels 0%, 0.25%, 0.50%, 0.75% and 1% of mixed herb in the ration. There were 3 replicates of 16 chicks each (mixed in male and female).

The basal diets were formulated to meet the nutritional requirements for chicken (NRC 1994) with ingredient composition and proximate analysis shown in Table 1. Feed and drinking water were provided for ad libitum consumption. Scheduled vaccinations against contagious diseases (Newcastle disease, Gumboro, fowl pox and avian influenza) were administered according to the instruction of the Veterinary Medicine Department of An Giang province.

Sampling and analyses

After 98 days of rearing, 12 average-weighted chickens in each treatment were individually weighed, labeled and subsequently subjected to a total feed withdrawal of 12 h, before slaughtered by severing the jugular vein. Subsequently, all carcasses were transferred to the Central laboratory of An Giang University using a cooler with ice. After removing skin, subcutaneous fat and visible connective tissue, both sides of the breast fillet ( Pectoralis major muscle) were kept in sealable polyethylene bags and stored at 2-4^oC for subsequent meat quality evaluation. Physicochemical traits such as pH, drip loss and cooking loss were determined in the left-side breast muscle while proximate composition and colour attributes were determined on the right-side muscle.

Physicochemical traits

At 24h postmortem, samples of breast meat were evaluated for the physicochemical traits. Drip loss was calculated as the percentage of weight loss during storage and cooking loss was measured by heating the same sample in a water bath (85°C, 25 min) and cooling to room temperature for 30 min.

Cooking loss was expressed as the percentage of weight loss after heating. The proximate composition of the breast meat (dry matter, ash, crude protein and crude fat) was determined according to the AOAC (2005) official standards. Each test was carried out in triplicate. The caloric value of breast meat was calculated according to Tashla et al (2019):

Caloric value (kcal/100g) = (crude protein (g/100g) × 4 kcal) + (crude fat (g/100g) × 9 kcal)

pH measurement

The pH of the meat samples was measured using a pH meter (Extech 407228 Heavy Duty pH/mV/Temperature Meter Kit, Extech Instruments) after calibration with standard buffers (4.0 and 7.0).

Colour measurement

Colour measurement was performed using a portable colourimeter (CR-20 Chromometer, Konica Minolta, Japan). The CIE (Commission Internationale de l'Éclairage) coordinates were lightness (L^*), redness (a^*), yellowness (b^*), and colour difference (∆E^*). The colourimeter was calibrated throughout the study using a white ceramic plate (CIE Standard Illuminant D65). Four readings were taken randomly from different locations of each sample of breast meat and areas selected for colour measurement of breast meat surface were free from obvious defects, such as bruises, discolourations, hemorrhages, damage, or any other condition that might have affected uniform colour reading (Petracci and Fletcher 2002). The colour was determined initially at 15 min. postmoterm (0h), 24, 48 and 72h postmortem. Colour difference was calculated as follows:

where , and represent the initial colour readings measured at 15 min. postmortem, and other values represent colour parameters measured at each subsequent time

Statistical analysis

Statistical analysis of the results was performed using MINITAB version 16.0. The significant differences of the quality variables of the meat samples were checked by one-way GLM procedure and Tukey test at a 5% level of probability.

Results and discussion

Physicochemical traits

Table 2 presents the physicochemical properties of breast meat. According to Font-i-Furnols (2015), water holding capacity (WHC) of the meat is the ability to retain its moisture when exposed to external forces, such as heating, pressing, gravity force, … In meat, the majority of water is immobilized within the myofibrill fillaments of the muscle. Due to postmortem changes in pH, this entrapped water is released. Meat WHC is affected by various factors, including the inherent (muscle types and genetics) as well as external factors (rearing conditions and pre- and post-slaughter handling methods). As shown in Table 2, the dietary supplementation did not influence drip loss (p>0.05). However, the cooking loss was higher (p<0.05) in the control treatment (HM) compared to that of treatments with herbal mixture, particularly with HM100 (21.8%). The levels of herb mixture tend to reduce the percentage of water escaping from the meat due to drip and cooking with R²>0.63 (Figures 1 and 2). These results were congruent with findings reported by Abbood et al (2017), showing that the supplementation of Borreria latifolia and Rosmarinus officinalis reduced the cooking loss of chicken breast meat.

The proximate composition of the chicken breast meat was slightly influenced by the treatments (Table 2). Despite the non-significant results of dry matter, ash and crude fat contents among the treatments (p>0.05), the levels of herbal supplementation positively affected the dry matter and ash (Figures 3 and 4) but adversely influenced the crude fat, as shown in Figure 6. The crude protein and caloric value were variables affected by the herbal mixture. The chicken breast in treatments with herbal supplementation had higher (p<0.05) protein content than that of control treatment (23.8-24.5% compared to 23.0%). This finding was in line with Sugiharto et al (2020), showing the inclusion of herbal mixture could improve the conversion of dietary protein and amino acids into meat muscle of Noi chickens.

It can also be observed that the inclusion of herbal mixture in chicken diet had significant alteration the caloric value of the meat. The addition of herbal mixture to chicken diet also resulted in significant increase in meat caloric value (p<0.05). Chickens fed with 0.25-1.0 g/100g of herb had the higher energetic value (105-108 kcal/100g) compared to that of the chickens fed diet without herb (102 kcal/100g) of breast meat (Table 2). These results are in agreement with findings of Tashla et al (2019), who found that the addition of hot red pepper resulted in the higher caloric value of breast meat (97.7 kcal/100g) compared to other treatments.

Figure 1. Effect of herb levels on the drip loss of chicken breast meat	Figure 2. Effect of herb levels on the cooking loss of chicken breast meat
Figure 3. Effect of herb levels on the dry matter of chicken breast meat	Figure 4. Effect of herb levels on the ash content of chicken breast meat

Figure 5. Effect of herb levels on the crude protein of chicken breast meat	Figure 6. Effect of herb levels on the crude fat of chicken breast meat

Changes in pH and colour of the chicken breast meat during cold storage

Considering the pH, results in Table 3 provide valuable information of the quality traits of raw meat (Tougan et al 2013; Tashla et al 2019). The pH value was initially determined at 6.20-6.27 (Table 3), then declined to 5.45-5.75 at 24h postmortem, which is within the normal range of ultimate pH (Font-i-Furnols 2015). The decline in pH value in meat during the first 24h storage might be caused by the isoelectric alteration following the denaturation of proteins (Barido et al 2022). After that, pH gradually increased to 5.75-5.89 and 5.84-6.13, respectively at 48h and 72h, under cold storage. This noticeable improvement in pH after 24h might be due to the glycolysis rate in raw meat as well as the growth of microorganisms on the meat surface and stimulating the degradation of fat and amino acids. However, the lower pH in treatment HM100 at 72h postmortem, might be due to the antimicrobial effect of herbal plant against microbial growth (Narciso-Gaytán et al 2011; Ashour et al 2020; Wang et al 2021).

Visual appearance or meat colour can have a significant impact on the customer acceptability and the decision to purchase meat products (Wattanachant 2008). The changes in the surface meat colour during cold storage are also shown in Table 3. The L ^* and b ^* values significantly increased in all groups, whereas the a ^* values decreased in all treatments. The results are consistent with the findings of Marcinkowska-Lesiak et al (2016) but contrast with those reported by Kaewthong et al (2019), who observed that storage times had no effect on the colour of chicken breast meat. In general, the oxidative process is responsible for colour changes in breast and thigh meat samples despite the supplementation of antioxidants (Narciso-Gaytán et al 2011) or storage conditions (da Rocha et al 2022). However, as reported by Onibi et al (2009), the oxidative stability, measured as the concentration of malondialdehyde in chicken meat, was improved by the supplementary garlic in the diets.

Redness (a^*) reduction in chicken meat during storage might be due to the lipid and pigment oxidation with time. The result is also in line with those of Muhlisin (2016), who found lower a ^* values of chicken breast meat during refrigerated storage for 4 days. In this study, antioxidants in the herbal mixture might limit the myoglobin oxidation, making slow declines of a ^* value over time of storage. Regarding the yellowness, the b ^* value can be manipulated by carotenoids consumption which results in pigment accumulation in the meat and skin (Barbut and Leishman 2022). As explained by Sugiharto et al (2020), the deposition of pigments in the cutaneous and subcutaneous tissues has commonly occurred, particularly when the chickens are provided diets with turmeric powder, similar to what is found in the current study.

Conclusions

• The supplementation of herbal mixture, particularly at the level of 1% in the diet, sinificantly reduced cooking loss but increased the crude protein content and caloric value of chicken breast meat.
  
  
• The values of pH and surface color were within the normal range of the chicken breast meat.
  
  
• Under cold storage conditions, pH values declined during the first 24h then gradually increased until 72h. The lightness and yellowness of breast meat significantly increased, whereas the redness decreased in all groups. Treatments with mixed herb showed sighnificantly higher values in yellowness and pH, respectively observed on the meat surface at 0h and 72h postmortem.

Acknowledgements

This study was supported by funds of An Giang Department of Science and Technology and An Giang University (Project No. 21.02.CS). The authors acknowledge their students for technical support.

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