La revue Viandes et produits carnés

Culinary processes and food comfortability in an older population

Aging is often accompanied by oral impairments, including the loss of teeth and a decline in saliva flow. These changes can lead older people to avoid the consumption of foods that are difficult to chew such as meat. This may consequently increase the risk of sarcopenia (loss of muscle mass, strength and performance) as well as the risk of protein-energy undernutrition in this population. In order to compensate the decline in oral health observed in older individual and to maintain meat consumption, we assessed the impact of four culinary processes (cooking bag, tenderizer, marinade and low-temperature cooking) on the perception of food comfortability in an older population when consuming different types of meat (chicken fillet, roast beef and beef steak). The results showed that low-temperature cooking combined with the use of a tenderizer or a marinade are promising processes to increase the tenderness and the juiciness of the meat, as well as to facilitate the formation of food bolus in older people.