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| Shaina Craig prepares samples for sensory evaluation study |
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| Caroline Babin, left, and Malekian pose beside 1st place winning poster |
Baton Rouge, LA - SU Ag Center researchers mentor college
students through the USDA (Evans Allen) funded project entitled Nutritional
Content, Antioxidant Activity and Microbiological Safety of Goat Meat and
Value-Added Goat Meat Products. Fatemeh
Malekian, professor, nutrition, and Margarita Khachaturyan, research associate,
mentored Shaina Graig, and Caroline Babin.
Dietary
habits are major factors in development of obesity and cardiovascular diseases.
Red meats such as beef and pork are associated with an increased risk of heart
disease. Although it has not been researched as extensively as beef or pork, data
show that goat meat has high nutritional value and greater unsaturated to
saturated fatty acid ratio as opposed to traditional red meats. However, goat
meat is generally unavailable in retail markets and annual consumption of the
meat is low in the USA (USDA, 1998). The unavailability and low consumption may
be due to factors such as consumers’ unfamiliarity or dislike of goat meat. Goat meat has the potential to improve
health of susceptible population without taking meat products out of their
daily diet by replacing traditionally consumed meats. The objective of this
study was to compare the nutritional composition of a goat meat product, to similar
pork product, and to evaluate consumer acceptability of the prepared goat meat
product.
Shaina Graig, an undergraduate student majoring in
Animal Science in the College of Sciences and Agriculture, accepted the
challenge to conduct a study as her Honors College project. The title of her research
project was, Nutritional Analysis and
Consumer Acceptability of Goat Meat Patties Compared to Pork Patties.
Shaina, who graduates in May, 2014 has been
working in the Food Composition Laboratory at Southern University Agricultural
Research and Extension Center for the past three years under the supervision of
Khachaturyan and Malekian.
Craig
has gained experience on the goat meat project, learned to operate all the
instruments, and co-authored a poster titled “Antioxidant Activity and Simultaneous
Determination of Vitamin E and Cholesterol in Rice Bran Added Goat Meat Products."
Shaina prepared goat and pork patties in the Southern University meat
laboratory under supervision of Albert Howard, she then cooked the patties and
conducted consumer acceptability test in the metabolic kitchen. She also analyzed the patties protein, fat,
moisture, ash, Carbohydrate.
The
result of her consumer acceptability showed that there was not a significant
difference in the aroma, taste, juiciness and overall acceptability between
goat and pork patties. There was a
significant difference in tenderness between goat and pork patties. The goat patties were less tender. Also there was a significant difference in
fat and moisture content. Goat has less fat and more moisture. The results are promising. Even though goat meat patties are a little
tougher but everything else was equal or better than pork patties (especially
with fat content).
The
researchers also mentored Caroline Babin, a junior student at St. Joseph’s
Academy by guiding her to conduct a science project titled The Effect of the Housing of the Chicken on its Egg’s Nutritional Composition. The project won Babin 1st place in Biochemistry at the 2014 Louisiana State Science and Engineering Fair, held
March 24-26 at the LSU Union.
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Contact:
Bridget Udoh
(225) 771-5714
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