CHILLED BEEF

Evening Post, Volume CVII, Issue 86, 10 April 1924, Page 9

CHILLED BEEF

NEW ANTISEPTIC PROCESS,

CFROM OUR OWH CORRESPONDENT.)

■ ' V . •' LONDON; 3rd March. Mr. R. S. Forsyth (London represen-. tative of the New Zealand Meat Producers' Board) and a. number of prominent members of the meat': trade came together recently to. witness the results of' a test- in keeping beef chilled for a , long, period after, the ■ carcass had been treated with an innocuous antiseptic. ''' Four quarters of beef were cut up and examined fort their condition. Two of Ibe .quarters ..had been kept at a temperature, varying from. 32 degrees to 41 degrees F. in a-small'machine-cooled refrigerator in a London office. In this cold chamber the temperature had'purposely been kept fairly high'and osciJlatingi. so as to provide a fairly severe test. The trial was to see. how long the meat would keep in a chilling temperature, after having been treated withi the process in question, which is understood to consist of flushing the arteries of £he meat immediately post mortem j with the special .'antiseptic employed. The chamber had been sealed under observation, and temperature records taken m. duplicate by an ordinary thermomel rer observed through a door in the chamber, and by a self-recording thermometer. . ■ \ The day of opening of the chamber was just 73 days after slaughter, which had been undertaken under ordinary trade conditions, and followed by antiseptic treatment, and the i man-handling in store, where it had been unwrapped. Tlie extreme length of storage had, it appeared to the observers, wrought a certain amount of surface mildew contamination, a harmless feature unattended, as was pointed out and confirmed, by any trace of black spot;' a damage that extends under tho surface, and cannot be wiped ot like the harmless mould. •',.'T h he,c other two quarters of a' beast killed and similarly treated were held in store for 26 days at a level temperature of 33 degrees F., and were found perfectly . sound, having no trace of any mould at all on their surface