抄録
Squid (Ommastrephes sloani pacificus) is one of the important sources of protein for Japanese, and the meat is often served in a boiled form. Despite the fact, however, the cooked meat is peculiarly tough for chewing. The authors tried to obtain some knowledge on the character of the boiled meat with an aim at reducing the toughness.
The breaking strength (F), breaking elongation (r), and elongative behavior (E) were taken as the index of toughness. The test pieces were cut out along the muscle fibre (or the minor axis of the body) from the body meat.
F, r, and E of the meat cooked in boiling water for 1 hour were found higher than those of the raw meat (cf. Fig. 1 and Table 2).
As obvious from Fig. 2 and Table 2, when the boiled meat heated in the solutions of various reagents at 100°C.for 1 hour, F and r of the meats decreased, while E increased. A remarkable increase in E was observed on the boiled meat treated with urea (10M) or alkali (pH 10) solution. When the boiled meat was heated at 108-109°C. (about 9 1bs.) for 1 hour in distilled water or in 3.5% NaCl solution, F and r of the meats, in particular the one immersed in water, decreased, but E remained constant in amount, as shown in Fig. 3 and Table 2. By heating the boiled meat in steam at 108-109°C. for 1 hour, F, r, and E remained almost unchanged.
