BONE PARTICLE CONTENT OF SOME MINCED FISH MUSCLE PRODUCTS

Minced fish muscle recovered by flesh separators may vary in bone particle content depending on the type of machine and the size of the openings that the fish are passed through to screen out the skin and bones. Orderly marketing of these materials will require some measure of control of the bone particle content. The method presented here for quantifying the bone particle content of minced flesh by gravity-flotation involves (1) shredding the flesh with a low-speed stirring device and (2) gravity separation of the bone, cartilage and other high-density components from the lower-density floatable muscle fibers. Experimental samples obtained by passing various fish materials through flesh separators and then through 1- and 2-mm flesh strainers were analyzed for their bone particle content by the proposed method. The bone particle content of flesh containing 25 to more than 100 particles per pound could be reduced by 70–100% by passage through strainers. Imported commercial samples displayed bone particle contents of 4 to over 400 per pound. Sensory panels could not detect more than 10% of the particles found by objective analysis. The gravity-flotation method may serve as a useful quality control tool.