Meat

Food aroma plays a major role in the satisfaction gained from eating, and meat is no exception. Extraction is a major and critical issue in the analyses of solid samples, particularly in the study of raw or cooked meat and, in general, it can be said that there are better and worse alternatives, but, unfortunately, there is no perfect extraction methodology. Since all aroma molecules are more or less volatile, the technique that is best suited to screen the odor-active molecules from the rest of the molecules is gas chromatography–olfactometry. The quantification of aroma compounds in meat presents several difficulties, since diverse groups constitute the aromatic substances, some of these compounds are very reactive. Since interaction between compounds released from the matrix might occur, the best way to confirm that all the compounds identified and correctly quantified actually contribute to the aroma in a food system is by an aroma reconstitution analysis.