Cultured yellowtails were killed by the following three different methods; (1) stabbing the spinal bulb, (2) dipping in cold sea water and (3) letting them to die in the air.
Immediately after death, the fish were stored at 5°C. Rigor index, ATP and its relative compounds, and hardness of the fish meat were measured at constant time interval to examine the relationship between the rigor phenomenon in the round fish and the hardness of the fish meat. The full rigor mortis was observed after 10h, 6h and 2h for the fish killed by the (1), (2) and (3), methods respectively.
No correlation was observed between the external hardness of the round fish and the hardness of the dorsal meat. The hardness of meat showed the highest value just after death and did not increase during storage.
As the stabbed fish maintained the hardness of meat longest after death, this method was found to be the most effective to offer high textural quality sashimi.
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