FLEISCHWIRTSCHAFT international 1/2018

Fleischwirtschaft international 1_2018
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Poultry
and 2015.In2015 14.3 million
tonnes of poultry were produced
in the EU, with Poland and France
as the leading producer countries
(2015:29.9% of all production).
Germany is third largest poultry
producer in the EU. Particularly
high growth in Europe has been
seen for chicken, at 79%. Poultry
production in the EU is expected
to rise 5.3% by 2025. Poultry imports
to the EU are mostly from
Brazil and Thailand.
The trend to poultry is also very
evident in the neighboring Netherlands.
Although overall meat consumption
has steadily declined in
recent years, consumption of poultry
has continued to rise (OPLAAT,2017).
In German poultry-raising, terms
like “x%grain-fed,” “extensive
free-range,” “free range,” “farm
free-range,” and “farm unfenced
free-range”are common. Organic
poultry is also on the market.
Available forms
Poultry is offered at retail in various
forms. In addition to entire slaughtered
birds, bird parts (breast, leg,
thigh, drumstick, wings, nuggets)
are commonly found in shops.
White meat is increasingly offered
in the form of poultry preparations
and meat products. These products
remain popular and are presented
in awide variety of ways at retail.
The preparations consist of
poultry meat with seasonings (salt,
spices and their aromatic extracts,
kitchen herbs and their aromatic
extracts), additives and stabilizing
systems. Specialist meat industry
suppliers like Hydrosol GmbH &
Co.KGfrom Ahrensburg, Germany,offer
stabilizing systems that
enable the targeted adjustment of
properties like shelf life, texture and
water binding.
Typical sales descriptions of
these preparations include “seasoned
and marinated chicken
meat.” Technically,these preparations
are minimally or not at all
treated, and the cell structure of the
meat is not fundamentally altered.
Poultry products have become
commonplace in stores. They
include:
r Rawsausage, such as salami, tea
sausage, and fresh poultry
tartare.
r Cooked sausages like poultry
sausage, chasseur sausage,
mortadella, beer ham sausage,
meat patés and roulades made of
or with poultry.
Fig 2: “Air-dried turkey ham; turkey thigh lean cutted, cured and joined together”
r Spreadable cooked sausage like
poultry liver paste, chopped fine
or coarse. These spreadable
cooked sausages are made of or
with poultry (Fig. 1).
r Aspic products, typically poultry
in aspic, often with vegetables or
mushrooms. The use of gelatine
needs to be specified in the
description, for example
“Chicken in pork gelatine”.
r Cured meats, such as turkey
ham. This is made from turkey
breast filet. Air-dried turkey ham
is also offered in stores. This
cured product is assembled from
pieces of turkey thigh meat
(Fig. 2).
Organic poultry products are now
also found in shops .
Declaration
Years ago, the declaration of poultry
products led to uncertainty on the
part of consumers. The most recent
change in the guidelines of the
German Food Book have brought
great improvements in consumer
information. Under the old rules, a
product sold as “Chicken sausage”
could also contain up to acertain
proportion of pork or beef meat and
fat without this being mentioned in
the sales description. These components
needed only be listed in the
ingredients.
A“poultry sausage”can now
contain only poultry.With the
changed guidelines, consumers can
be sure that not just products
marked “100% poultry”or“Pure
poultry,” but also products marked
as “Poultry sausage”are made
exclusively from poultry meat.
Products of mixed poultry and
pork must now be labeled “Poultry
sausage with 10%pork,” for example.
Mere listing in the ingredients
is no longer enough. Meat from
other animals must now be explicitly
mentioned in the sales description.
“Chicken sausage”or“Turkey
sausage”can contain only that kind
of poultry meat. The type of poultry
in “poultry sausage”can be seen in
the ingredients list. The exact
composition must be shown, for
example “chicken and turkey meat”,
with the highest amount being
named first.
Marking of vegetable fats and oils:
Poultry is very lean, but cooked
sausages require acertain amount
of fat, so vegetable oils or fats are
often used in poultry sausage. The
vegetable oils or fats used (such as
sunflower,rapeseed or olive oil)
must be named in the sales description.
Forexample, these products
might be sold as “Poultry sausage
with rapeseed oil.”
Rawsausage made of poultry
meat also contains vegetable fats,
since the visible pork fat normally
found in salami cannot be used.
Butthe melt behavior and mouth
feel should be similar to pork fat.
Such products are sold as “Poultry
salami with vegetable fat”(Fig. 3).
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