Pig Anatomy

[YT2095]

here`s a question that`s bugged me for years!

 

if anyone here`s ever tried Bacon or Ham, you`ll have noticed that it`s quite salty!

and yet a pork roast isn`t and often requires salt.

now it`s all off the same animal, so what is the reason that a shoulder of pork is salty and yet the cuts from the rear are not, and the texture is entirely different too?

 

and you can rule of the curing process too, I`ve already experimented with that, and although Ham and Bacon do have extra salt added (sometimes too much) there is Still a difference!

[Sayonara]

The most obvious difference between the shoulders and the rump is that the shoulders do a lot more work. Been ages since I did muscle structure and mechanics but I'm pretty sure that would lead to a difference in texture and the concentration of various ions in the tissue.

[YT2095]

that makes sense, but the salt difference is SO marked, that I`de have thought those levels would have been toxic to the extreme, I`m not 100% sure, but I think 5 or 7% saline is the most we can take directly into our blood, and our blood is no where near as salty as the shoulder cuts?

 

the texture part makes perfect sense though.

[daisy]

I kind of think it has to be something to do with the curing process YT. Physiologically, cells are kept osmotically stable with high K+ low Na+ (relative to extracellular fluid) and equimolar Cl-. Any disruption of the homeostatic equilibrium in living cells would destroy them. Therefore, salty meat (i.e high NaCl) is presumably due to the curing medium used in the meat processing procedure. Dead meat (i.e. dead cells) cannot maintain osmotic potential/homeostasis. So, if you use a high concentration of salt to cure meat, then the cells will take up salt by passive diffusion. I can't explain why bacon and gammon would be saltier but I bet it's something to do with the preservation process.

[Glider]

It is to do with the curing process. Bacon, gammon and ham all have lots of salt added, sometimes cuts are packed in salt to cure, sometimes they are steeped in salt water before drying/smoking, depends on what product you want to end up with. It's mainly the salt that stops the meat from rotting.

[YT2095]

thnx guys

 

here`s some new data I picked up whilst away, I`ve tried un cured bacon as stated in post#1 and it IS salty, even before the cure, I was told it`s to do with the way pigs are hung (back legs) then the throat is cut and they bleed into buckets, during this the blood runs towards gravity, and stays there untill the heart stops, that mass of blood ions accumulate, and that`s what makes it unhealthily salty.

you see I had to wonder why uncured meat still had this saltyness, so I asked a mate of mine that works in a slaughter house, and that seems to be the reason

 

amazing what you can find out if you ask the right people during a day off )

[Skye]

Wouldn't this apply to beef too?

[daisy]

Wouldn't this apply to beef too? I would have thought so. The slaughter man's statement still doesn't explain the physiological facts....cells that are alive (be they pig, cow or chicken) will maintain osmotic homeostasis....dead cells won't and will be subject to passive diffusion and osmotic gradients. Those gradients will be the same for any land vertebrate I think...unless you know different.

[Glider]

Moreover, the cells will continue their processes (maintaining osmotic homeostasis) for some time after the heart has stopped (until each cell runs out of its own energy).