Highlights
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- Consumer acceptability of entire male pork at eating
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- A segment of pork lovers, regardless of the level of boar taint, has been identified.
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- A segment of boar meat lovers and another that rejects boar tainted meat was found.
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- There is a niche for meat from medium and high levels of boar taint.
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- Meat classification according to boar taint level is needed to better orientate it.
Abstract
Two
consumer studies were conducted to know the acceptability of pork with
different boar taint levels: test 1 performed in Spain (n = 126) and
United Kingdom (n = 146), and test 2 performed in France (n = 139) and
Italy (n = 140). Each test had 3 types of pork: ‘Female meat’, ‘Low boar
tainted meat’, and a third type was ‘Medium boar tainted meat’ or ‘High
boar tainted meat’. Three main clusters were identified on the basis of
‘How delicious do you find this meat?’: 1—Pork lovers, 2—Boar meat
lovers, 3—Reject boar tainted meat. Additionally, in test 2, a fourth
cluster was identified: ‘Reject low tainted meat’. A group of 16.2–38.2%
of consumers rejected meat from boars, and another group of 12.4–21.7%
rated the meat with medium or high levels of boar taint better than the
meat from females, identifying a niche for meat from medium and high
levels of boar taint, and suggesting the need to select carcasses on the
basis of boar taint.
Keywords
- Acceptability;
- Androstenone;
- Boar taint;
- Consumers;
- Clusters;
- Skatole
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