Relationship between pH before salting and dry-cured ham quality

The effect of pH before salting on pork quality was studied in two sets of experiments: 904 hams, set A; and 104 hams, set B; the latter was used to verify the results from A. After pH measurements, the hams were subjected to the traditional process for producing Spanish dry-cured ham and then evaluated by an expert panel to correlate the sensory characteristics to the pH measurement before salting. The parameters evaluated were pastiness, softness, anomalous cut colour, crusting and white spots. Moisture, non-protein nitrogen, salt, protein, nitrate and nitrite were determined in samples from both experiments. The results obtained in experiment A showed that pastiness is closely related to the pH before salting (p<0.001), but not softness. From the receiver operating characteristics curve, a cut-off point of pH of 5.55 was selected to classify the raw material in two groups: normal-pH and low-pH hams. The pH before salting can also be correlated with the appearance of anomalous cut colour and crusting in hams. White spots were absent in both pH groups. Regarding compositional parameters, there were significant differences in moisture (p<0.001), salt (p<0.001), protein (p<0.001), non-protein nitrogen (p<0.001) and nitrate (p<0.05) contents between low-pH and normal-pH hams. The results from experiment B, confirmed the relationship between pH before salting and the appearance of defective texture and colour in the final product. Also results from experiment B confirmed the compositional parameters found in experiment A. Thus, the pH before salting is a good predictor for meat quality allowing the classification of the raw material in the first stage of manufacture. After classification, some modifications to the processing can improve the final characteristics of dry-cured hams.