ABSTRACT
This chapter addresses the principles for reducing fat in different processed meat products, describing the difficulties and possible strategies considering the sensory acceptance, overall stability, and safe consumption of the reformulated products. In addition to texture, flavor and taste can also be altered by the fat reduction in meat products. The development of reformulated products with fat reduction with equivalent satiety index, that is, those products with greater capacity to inhibit appetite for a longer period after consumption, would attract the interest of industry and consumers, constituting an additional technological challenge. In this context, fat reduction should be accompanied by a product reformulation that produces physiological effects on satiety, constituting an additional challenge. Fat reduction strongly affects emulsion stability, water-binding capacity, and gel formation, with negative effects on the quality of the final products. The major technological challenge of fat reduction in fermented sausages is the maintenance of the characteristic texture, due to the addition of pork back fat.
