Using Celery Powder in a Semi-Dry Fermented Sausage ‘Heat-Treated Sucuk’: Nitrosamine Formation, Lipid Oxidation, and Volatile Compounds

This study investigated the effect of using celery powder (CP) as source of pre-converted nitrite (treatments: A: 150 mg/kg NaNO₂, B: 100 mg/kg NaNO₂ + CP as 50 mg/kg NaNO₂ equivalent, C: 50 mg/kg NaNO₂ + CP as 100 mg/kg NaNO₂ equivalent, D: CP as 150 mg/kg NaNO₂ equivalent) on the physicochemical and microbiological properties in heat-treated sucuk (HTS), a kind of semi-dry fermented sausage. The influence of cooking time (CT) on the nitrosamine formation in HTS with and without CP was also determined. The results indicated that the use of CP increased the pH value and decreased the a_w value. <i>Micrococcus/Staphylococcus</i> and residual nitrite were not affected by the use of CP. TBARS value varied from 0.78 to 0.90 mg MDA/kg. CP did not affect the abundance of hexanal in HTS, however, it increased the abundance of camphene. The results of PCA showed that treatments A, B, and C had similar volatile compound profiles. CP did not affect both N-nitrosodimethylamine and N-nitrosodiethylamine, but their levels increased as the CT increased. Increased CT also resulted in increased N-nitrosopiperidine (NPIP) in all treatments, but the cooking for 1 min did not cause a significant increase in treatments A, B, and C. CP leads to a significant increase in NPIP content, especially after 3 and 5 min of cooking in HTS.