Rinsing Pretreatment With Hydrogen Peroxide Prior to Vacuum Packaging Delays Quality Deterioration and Inhibits Microbial Spoilage of Fresh Chilled Pork During Cold Storage

To maintain sensory qualities and ensure microbial safety, freshly slaughtered and chilled pork was pretreated with 5% hydrogen peroxide (H₂O₂) solution for 1 min before vacuum packaging (VP) using polyethylene bags. During storage of 14 days at 4°C, sensory attributes including color, appearance, overall sensory score, pH, and volatile compounds, were assessed. Results demonstrated that H₂O₂ pretreatment or VP alone could effectively maintain the color, appearance, and overall quality of fresh chilled pork. The combination of H₂O₂ pretreatment and VP package resulted in lower pH value of 6.31 ± 0.01 and a reduced total viable count (TVC) of 6.13 ± 0.06 log CFU g^-1 on Day 14 compared with the single treatment and the control. Furthermore, the H₂O₂ + VP treatment significantly preserved the surface color, thiobarbituric acid reactive substances (TBARS) level, and total volatile basic nitrogen (TVB-N). Specifically, the lightness L* value observed from the combined treatment was still at 91.08% of the starting value (Day 0) after 8 days of storage. After 14 days of storage, pork samples in the combined treatment group showed the least quality loss, with TBARS of 0.50 mg kg^-1 and TVB-N of 14.50 ± 0.20 mg 100g^-1, respectively. Overall, a combination of H₂O₂ + VP extended the shelf-life of chilled pork to 14 days, while that of the control was only 6 days. Therefore, integrating H₂O₂ pretreatment with vacuum packaging proved to be an efficient, practical, and promising method to preserve fresh chilled pork.