Development and evaluation of chicken meat nuggets enriched with date palm fruit (Phoenix dactylifera L.)

Abstract

A study was conducted to enrich the chicken nuggets with date palm fruit as it is a good natural antioxidant as well as sensory property enhancer. Dried date palm fruits were soaked in boiling water to prepare date palm paste and it was incorporated into chicken emulsion replacing 2.5%, 5% and 7.5% chicken meat to prepare chicken nuggets. A control group of chicken nuggets was made for experiment. Emulsions were stuffed into stainless steel boxes to steam cook for 45 minutes to prepare chicken nuggets. Proximate composition, total phenolics, TBARS, total plate count etc were conducted as quality parameters of chicken nuggets using date palm. 7.5% date palm incorporated chicken nuggets showed less lipid oxidation as TBARS value was lowest 0.20±0.004 and highest total phenolic content of 0.19±0.01. But 5% date palm incorporated chicken nuggets showed high acceptability in sensory evaluation. Up to 5% level of date palm added chicken nuggets were highly acceptable though 7.5% showed high in phenolic content, higher sweetness and less in lipid oxidation.