ahead of the curve

While catching up on my morning emails, I stumbled across this article from MeatingPlace: 

GNP Launches Chicken Sausage Line.  I literally laughed out loud, then called GNP out for stealing my novel idea, and reverted to myself as a genius clearly ahead of my time!  

All of these clearly rational thoughts and ideas, as you may remember from a previous blog, are a result of the product I developed in my processed meats course this semester.  Myself being innovative and consumer driven decided to put forth efforts in creating a Cajun Chicken Sausage.  A product that would provide flavor and a healthier alternative to pork and beef RTE products.  So now, only after being out of class for one week and basking in successful product development, I am baffled that my idea paralleled that of a national company in providing poultry products: Gold 'n Plump.

Behind their innovation GNP developed a few lines of chicken sausages: Parmesan Italian,  Hot Italian Chicken Sausages, Chicken Brats and Apple Maple Chicken Breakfast Links. **Note the absence of a Cajun sausage--guess their is still room for the initiation of my product to the marketplace! Products should soon be available in the fresh meat sections of grocery stores nationwide selling for $4.49 to $5.99 per package. A price similar to what I "projected" my product to be sold for.  

Behind the development of their product, GNP wanted to produce a healthier to pork and beef selections of brats and sausages, but wanted to maintain good flavor, variety, and convenience.  Their product is made from 100 percent, boneless, skinless thigh meat, again similar to the product I developed (you see where I am gathering the genius notion from).  Because of the lean meat ingredient, the chicken sausages contain 50 percent less fat than most pork varieties, according to the company. The products contain 4.5 to 8 grams of fat and 100 to 180 calories per serving, meeting the needs of GNP customers.  Further the new sausages are also gluten-free and nitrate-free, and three of the four are also dairy-free providing a "natural" type product that is limited of allergen causing agents.  Now I must admit that GNP provides an "edge" to their product in this realm of production.  But that doesn't mean there is room for my product in the marketplace!!!

The most comical thought from this whole situation is the fact I told Chasen I wanted to start raising a few chickens-mainly to gather eggs everyday.  But now, after this whole ordeal, I am thinking I need to raise broiler chickens (I'm talking hundreds), get a large meat grinder and stuffer and start marketing my own line of poultry processed products!!  Although I am a beef girl at heart, one can honestly see there is money to be made here!!  


But on second thought, I guess I could sell my "secret Cajun recipe" to the folks at GNP and get paid for less involvement....or I could just print off my recipe for the sausage and serve the Cajun goodness to family and friends while sharing my "fishing story" of Cajun chicken sausages persay.  And after thinking rationally for a moment, I think I may just do that!

happy i love beef month!

Many a discussion have been held on the importance of celebrating Valentine's Day.  For some it is a day of chocolates, flowers, sweet cards, and a few extra kisses.  For others it is simply a reminder they remain single (by choice or chance) and for that reason is loathed.  I am a simple romantic and for that reason LOVE Valentine's Day.  Heck, I have had my card picked out for Chasen for over two weeks now!!!  Yet I somehow have managed to resist the urge to buy a box of chocolates--looks like I do have self control.....or am just waiting for them to go on sale haha.

Regardless, whether you are a romantic or a rebel on Valentine's Day, everyone can find a reason to celebrate the month of February!!  Last year, the Beef Checkoff program claimed February as "I Heart Beef" month!  You may have seen this logo, or at least you should expect to see it soon through communications and publications courtesy of your state Beef Council.

Although I love beef every month, and every day of each month, this campaign was developed by the Checkoff program to improve sales of middle meats during their typical winter slump.  This drop in middle meat sales occurs not by a decrease in quality or a surplus of beef; but simply the fact most consumers are not firing up the grill with 3 feet of snow on the ground.  Through the month of February the Checkoff hopes to remind consumers of their passion for steaks such as the T-Bone, Porterhouse, Ribeye, Strip (my favorite), and Tenderloin.  With February also being the month for Heart Health, the Checkoff wants to share with consumers the 29 lean cuts of beef that can be part of a healthy, low saturated fat diet. 

I found the following statistics on the Beef Checkoff's webpage and thought they are a great way to put beef in your month of February!

• In this month of romance, 62% of Americans prefer beef.  Nothing says "I Love You" like a great steak dinner on v-day. 
• 35% of Americans prefer a Ribeye steak, with 32% having preference for a T-bone steak when sharing a meal with a significant other.
• Americans often associate beef with celebrations (50%), followed by chicken 18%, pork 17%, and then fish 15%.
• 60% of Americans feel that beef is the best way for their dinner partner to show gratitude or appreciation.

As I mentioned before, I love beef every day of every month.  This may be done through a juicy steak dinner, or delicious hamburger for lunch, but mostly it is through the joy of raising cattle--and by the looks of this little guy he knows it's true!  Hopefully you too can find a way to make beef part of your daily lives!

manic monday

I can definitely tell it is a Monday.  And in case anyone was wondering, being sick on a Monday, makes everything about being a Monday worse.


We also got our research schedule for the week, which as you may have guessed added to the Mondayness of today.  Our meats group has three different research projects going on this week, it's going to get a little crazy around here!  For one project we will weigh whole product, fabricate steaks, weigh steaks, take pictures of the steaks, trace muscles within the steaks, and prepare samples for WBSF.  Needless to say, all of our knives will get a lot of use this week!


Being a Monday, however, makes me excited for the weekend!  I am heading back to Iowa to attend a meeting with Chasen.  "Spouse's" are invited to attend this weekend, and being his fiance, Chasen has been quite insistent on me going!  So on Friday evening, I am invited to supper as a part of the Ag Leader's Institute through the Iowa Farm Bureau.  From what he has told me, it sounds like a neat opportunity for young farmers and ranchers to enhance their leadership and advocacy skills.  There are four weekend meetings held this spring, and then in the fall Chasen will get to fly to Washington DC to meet with lawmakers that work with ag policy.  How cool is that?!! 


We should be done with the conference by 3:00 on Saturday afternoon, giving us enough time to get back to Knoxville to see the renovation of the barn in the daylight!  This past weekend the barn on Stevenson Farms got re-sided and a barn quilt was hung.  The quilt is a piece of siding from the old hog barn we tore down early this summer.  This fall Tamra painted the Stevenson Farms logo (which I so keenly designed) on the wood, and had the Amish hang it this weekend.  When Chasen mentioned the quilt this morning, I insisted he send me a picture.  After seeing it  I am soooo much more excited to see it in person!

Heading back to the farm, I will also get to see the baby calves born last week.  They should be quite spunky by time I get there, and I must admit I am excited.  Chasen took Roxie back with him yesterday, so she will have all week to bond with the calves as well. The game of tag she plays with them is quite adorable--I will make sure to take lots of pictures!!

All things considered, today has been quite hectic, and the rest of this week is not looking much better.  Needless to say, I will be counting down the hours until my car is east bound!

chillin while grillin

Yesterday we had the first taste panel training session for the remainder of my thesis project.  I arrived on campus extra early to make sure I had everything ready to go by time we would start cooking at 9:45.  To my surprise, my advisor notified me we would need to move the session a full hour earlier to accommodate a meeting that got scheduled over the weekend.  Being an assertive and organized individual, this change in plans did not settle well.  Soon after his announcement  I developed sweaty palms, a slight headache, and rapid heart rate. At the end of the day, I realized things went fairly well for planning on the fly.....something I never enjoy doing.  


Anyway, back to the process of running a taste panel.  After the product has been selected, sampling randomized, and taste panelist trained, it is time to prepare steaks for tasting.  To ensure all steaks are cooked to a proper end temperature, thermocouples (the red thermo cables below) are threaded through the steak.  We try to place the end of the thermocouple in the geometric center of the steak.  The blue plastic piece is then inserted into a thermometer to measure the change in temperature.



Once steaks reach the desired temperature they can be removed from the grill.  We use an internal temperature of 71 degrees, or medium well.  Using 71 degrees as an endpoint is fairly standard across the realm of meat science research.  It allows the product to maintain its apparent juiciness, yet allows for adequate muscle fiber degradation, or tenderness, to occur.    A simple tug on the thermocouple will remove it from the steak and it is now ready to cut.


For sample size, panelist are served a 1cm cubed pieced of meat.  To do so we use the cubing tray pictured below.  Before the steak is cubed, all excess fat and connective tissue need to be trimmed off the steak to prevent an unacceptable sample.  It works best to square off the steak so it fits better into the tray. 




Since I am such a neat freak I love cubing samples!  It can turn an ugly, un-symmetrical steak into tiny cubes of tasty perfection.  




Panelist are then served 1 cube of meat to do their analysis.  Between samples it is strongly suggested the eat a non-salted saltine crack (yum :S) and take a drink of double distilled water.   This process helps cleanse the palate and prepare the panelist for their next sample.


Through the preparation for taste panels in research, I have relied heavily on my fellow graduate students.  Not only have they helped me cook, clean the kitchen, and serve samples, but they have also made time in the kitchen enjoyable.  Many a conversation have been held in the kitchen...some beneficial some not so much.  But as I said, it sure makes time fly!

the swing of things

This week marks the third and final 4-day work week for me for the month of January.  And I must admit it terrifies me to think how long next week is going to drag on!  Aside from next week being a normal 5-day working week, I am starting taste panel training sessions for the final part of my thesis project.  Although this is exciting, I am also anxious about all the time and effort required in organizing a taste panel.  Nonetheless, I think this panel will be the best way to get back into the swing of things.

Taste panels are commonly used in meat science research to assess the palatability of new products, cooking methods, or aging techniques.  In my case, this taste panel will assess the palatability-or tasting/eating quality-of the extended sirloin cap. Taste panels are a means to detect differences in product tenderness, juiciness, flavor, connective tissue content, off-flavor, visual appearance, and aroma.  It is the true way to determine the way a product will be perceived in the industry.

With that being said, there are two types of taste panels: consumer or trained.  Consumer panels are often conducted in retail or restaurant settings where consumers have little knowledge on product background, and the process of taste analysis.  Consumer panels provide insight to how the general population will receive the product and it's attributes, and often have a large sample population.  Because of this, sample variation is quite large and statistical significance may be difficult to achieve.  Consumer panels also take an immense amount of time and collaboration with grocery stores or restaurants to plan.  Incentives are often given to consumer taste panelists, such as coupons, to increase participation.

As you may have guessed, I will be conducting a trained taste panel session within the next few weeks.  Trained sessions include taste panelists that have been educated on the attributes of a particular product.  These panelists are typically trained using product that is extremely tough, tender, juicy, etc. in order to create a organoleptic scale upon which they will later "grade" a product's acceptability. In my case, panelists will be trained on the extended sirloin cap quality.  We will utilize product from the anterior and posterior ends of the primal, where a true tenderness gradient exists.  Our primary goal for this taste panel is to determine the tenderness differences of the cap depending upon location. For that reason, each steak's location from it's primal will be maintained throughout the panel. Panelists will be asked to rate the product on a hedonic scale (1-8) on the product's apparent juiciness, tenderness, off-flavor, and connective tissue content.  Taste panel sessions will be held twice a day and will consist of 6 panelist.  These panelist will be compensated with a paycheck for their participation and offered chocolate each day--sounds like the real deal, right?!  I can say that I am jealous! haha

All things considered, taste panels are a very important part of what we do as meat scientist.  If we develop a product that consumers find tough, or dry, we need to reconsider how the product was made.  It truly is our way of creating and developing an acceptable and quality product for consumers!