Anti-rancidity protection for ready meals
Ready meals
Ready meals
New findings on VivOX 4, an all-natural preservative that is produced and marketed by Vitiva, suggest that effective anti-rancidity protection is conferred for various types of meat-based ready meals. This versatile oil-soluble, water-dispersible formula helps increase shelf life and reduces warmed over flavour (WOF), while retaining the important organoleptic characteristics of the product. Production of meat-based ready meals includes thermal processing that affects the fats present in food and increases their oxidative instability. This instability is even greater when foods are battered and fried, due to oil pick up of fried products such as chicken nuggets, battered fish etc. During cooling, freezing, transportation and warehousing, there is an increased exposure to oxygen and light, which accelerates unwanted changes of ready meals such as rancidity, organoleptics characteristics and appearance of WOF. By adding allergen-free VivOX 4 formula, the shelf life of meat-based ready meals can be extended by 2-5 times in comparison to control samples that utilise traditional synthetic ingredients, while still maintaining the original taste and flavour profile.