Innovative cooking with air jet impingement: Enhancing beef and chicken quality, safety, and efficiency

This study investigated the cooking of beef and whole chicken under varying conditions in an air jet impingement oven and compared the results to conventional oven cooking. The effects of cooking parameters; oven temperature (°C), air velocity (m/s), tray position, and cooking time (min) on meat quality were evaluated, and optimal conditions were determined using response surface methodology. For beef, target responses included internal redness (a*), total protein content (g/100 g DM), minimized thiobarbituric acid reactive substances (TBARS, µg malonaldehyde/g), minimized hardness (N), and a safe core temperature of 72 °C with a cooking value ≥ 5.00. For whole chicken, the core temperature was targeted at 82 °C (above the microbiological safety threshold of 75 °C), water-holding capacity (%) was maximized, TBARS was set at 0.5, and hardness was maintained within an optimal range considering the presence of bones. The optimal cooking conditions were identified as 175 °C, 15 m/s, 19 min, and middle tray position for beef, and 200 °C, 15 m/s, 20 min, and middle tray position for whole chicken. Under these conditions, core temperatures exceeded safe thresholds for both products. Cooking in the air jet impingement oven achieved high-quality results at lower temperatures and shorter times compared to conventional ovens, with energy savings of 54.41% for beef and 31.19% for whole chicken. Furthermore, air jet impingement cooking reduced the formation of harmful heterocyclic amines (HCAs) while maintaining microbiological safety, despite a slight increase in aerobic bacteria counts due to shorter cooking durations.