Effects of Replacing Pork Back Fat with Canola and Flaxseed Oils on Physicochemical Properties of Emulsion Sausages from Spent Layer Meat

The objective of this study was to investigate the effects of canola and flaxseed oils on the physicochemical properties and sensory quality of emulsion-type sausage made from spent layer meat. Three types of sausage were manufactured with different fat sources: 20% pork back fat (CON), 20% canola oil (CA) and 20% flaxseed oil (FL). The pH value of the CA was significantly higher than the others (p<0.05). The highest water holding capacity was also presented for CA; in other words, CA demonstrated a significantly lower water loss value among the treatments (p<0.05). CA had the highest lightness value (p<0.05). However, FL showed the highest yellowness value (p<0.05) because of its own high-density yellow color. The texture profile of the treatments manufactured with vegetable oils showed higher values than for the CON (p<0.05); furthermore, CA had the highest texture profile values (p<0.05) among the treatments. The replacement of pork back fat with canola and flaxseed oils in sausages significantly increased the omega-3 fatty acid content (p<0.05) over 15 to 86 times, respectively. All emulsion sausages containing vegetable oil exhibited significantly lower values for saturated fatty acid content and the omega-6 to omega-3 ratios compared to CON (p<0.05). The results show that using canola or flaxseed oils as a pork fat replacer has a high potential to produce healthier products, and notably, the use of canola oil produced characteristics of great emulsion stability and sensory quality.