CHANGES IN QUALITY ATTRIBUTES OF GREY MULLET FISH (Mugil cephalus) ROE DURING COLD STORAGE AT (4± 1oC)

Zakar, A.H.

Department of fish processing and quality control, Central Laboratory of Aquaculture Research, (CLAR), Agriculture Research Center, Egypt.

Abstract

The fishing industry is expected to develop products from edible parts of the fish whenever possible. When fish is caught during spawning season, roe can comprise a considerable percentage of the female bodyweight. The roe is an excellent raw material for the production of diverse delicacies that can be sold at good prices in many markets. So, in this study chemical composition, qualitative, microbial and sensory changes in fresh roe (control), salted and grilled roe of grey mullet fish (Mugil cephalus) during refrigerated storage at 4±1°C were investigated at days 0, 3, 6, 9 and 12 of storage. Moisture, protein, fat and ash of fresh and processed roe were determined. The results indicated that moisture, protein and fat contents were 60.41, 22.3 and 12.6% respectively for fresh roe ”FR”, while sharply decrease in moisture content was noticed for other treatments after processing directly. Protein content was slightly significant increased (P<0.5) during storage period and reached to 23.5, 28.8, 32.0 and 32.9% for fresh roe ”FR”, salted roe ”SR”, grilled roe outside fish body ”GRout”, and grilled roe inside fish body ”GRin” samples respectively at the end of storage period. Fat content was increased to 14.1, 13.3, and 14.6% for SR, GRout and GRin at zero time respectively, but was significantly decreased (P<0.5) with progress of storage time for all treatments.

In the quality analysis findings TMA-N, TVB-N and TBA values of SR and GRout samples were stayed within the acceptability limit values till the day 9 of storage period.

Microbiological analyses revealed the processed roe had lowest total bacterial count (TBC) and psychrophilic bacteria (PsBC) compared with raw roe. According to sensory results, it was observed that SR and GRout samples were evaluated with higher points in terms of texture, colour and flavour than the fresh roe and grilled roe ”GRin” samples during storage period. Thus, the salting and grilling process with cold storage can be good methods to extension shelf life with maintaining high quality in the mullet fish roe samples.

Keywords: Mullet fish (Mugil cephalus) roe, salting and grilling process, proximate composition, quality, microbiology and sensory properties, cold storage.