Determination of α-tocopherol in pork with high intramuscular fat content

Abstract

Extraction of α-tocopherol from pork samples with low (3%) (LF) or high (9%) (HF) amount of intramuscular fat have been carried out by three different methods, two of them based in saponification plus extraction of α-tocopherol and the other one without saponification. All samples were spiked with five different amount of α-tocopherol prior to analysis. In LF samples, recovery was in the range 85-95% in all cases, with not significant differences between methods. Recovery was much lower in HF samples when using methods which involve prior saponification of muscle samples (50-60%). Changes in KOH concentration did not improve markedly the recovery. The method based on direct extraction provided much better recovery in HF samples (85-92%) and consequently is recommended for samples high in fat.