Quality Characteristics of Dark Muscle from Yellowfin Tuna Thunnus albacares to Its Potential Application in the Food Industry

Abstract

Dark muscle from yellowfin tuna is an important edible fish by-product. However, it has a low commercial value, and it is underutilized. The present study was conducted to establish the characteristic of this by-product. Myoglobin concen-tration in tuna dark muscle is high (9650.12 mg/kg). Total iron in tuna muscle was 32.11 mg/kg, higher than other ani-mal foods like veal or pork, and heme iron concentration was 23.56 mg/kg (73.38% of the total iron), indicating a high bioavailability of heme iron in dark muscle from yellowfin tuna, which is a nutritional advantage. As for the techno-logical properties, yellowfin tuna dark muscle had a water holding capacity of 8.37 g water/g and oil holding capacity of 8.11 g oil/g. This indicates that tuna dark muscle has possible applications to elaborate products, such as emulsion-ated foods or cooked products, so its industrialization is possible.