Maximizing the quality and storage life of fresh seafood products
| Title | Maximising the quality and storage life of fresh seafood products |
| Article Written by | Mike Mitchell, Michaela Archer |
| Research Done at | Seafish.org |
| Published Date | March 1, 2017 |
What the research is about
Seafood is highly perishable, this means that unless there has been an intervention which changes the physical nature of the product, such as freezing, cooking, drying, smoking or canning, fresh seafood products will continually deteriorate in quality over time. Visual and physical changes effect the consumer’s perception of the product to the eventual point where it would be considered unappealing or even inedible. This briefing note is aimed at businesses that catch, process, buy, sell or trade fresh seafood products; it seeks to improve the understanding of those factors that cause the natural deterioration of seafood products due to spoilage, and to ensure that businesses are able to mitigate and remediate those changes as far as possible to ensure that the maximum storage lives for their products are achieved.
Research conclusion
The most important aspects have been and will probably always be, the management of time and temperature. We may have improved our technical capability to manage temperature through refrigeration and ice making technologies, and temperature control throughout the whole supply chain from catch to point of sale can be maintained more effectively – but our expectations of shelf life in the retail environment and in the home, have also changed, and we expect longer shelf lives than ever before.
Unless exceptional abuse has occurred, the best quality fish will be that with the shortest shelf life from point of capture. Temperature control cannot restore lost quality, but it can maximize storage life by slowing down the natural microbiological and enzymatic changes that take place in any animal postmortem; this means that temperature control and hygienic practices are the most important aspects of ensuring that shelf life and freshness are maximized.
Assurant Innovations take
Good fundamental overview of how fish freshness is important in the Seafood industry. The Fish Fat Meter (Torrymeter), which uses and measures the Torry Scheme that measures fish freshness, was mentioned as one of the key standard tools used in the Seafood industry.
Fish Freshness Meter (Torrymeter)
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