CARBOHYDRATE IN MEAT.–Within the liver and all muscle fibers of animals is saved a small provide of carbohydrate in a type that is named glycogen, or muscle sugar. Nonetheless, there’s not sufficient of this substance to be of any considerable worth, and, as far as the strategies of cookery and the makes use of of meat as meals are involved, it’s of no significance.

WATER IN MEAT.–The proportion of water in meat varies from one-third to three-fourths of the entire, relying on the quantity of fats the meat incorporates and the age of the animal. This water carries with it the flavour, a lot of the mineral matter, and a few meals materials, in order that when the water is faraway from the tissues these items are to a terrific extent misplaced. The strategies of cookery utilized to meat are primarily based on the precept of both retaining or extracting the water that it incorporates. The meat by which water is retained is extra simply chewed and swallowed than that which is dry. Nonetheless, the water contained in flesh has no better worth as meals than different water. Due to this fact, as might be seen in Fig. 1, the better the quantity of water in a given weight of meals, the much less is its nutritive worth.

MINERALS IN MEAT.–Eight or extra sorts of minerals in enough portions to be of significance within the weight loss plan are to be present in meat. Lean meat incorporates essentially the most minerals; they lower in proportion as the quantity of fats will increase. These salts help within the constructing of laborious tissues and have a determined impact on the blood. They’re misplaced from the tissues of meat by sure strategies of cookery, however as they’re in answer within the water by which the meat is cooked, they needn’t be misplaced to the weight loss plan if use is fabricated from this water for soups, sauces, and gravies.

EXTRACTIVES IN MEAT.–The appetizing taste of meat is because of substances referred to as extractives. The everyday taste that serves to tell apart pork from beef or mutton is because of the distinction within the extractives. Though needed for flavoring, these don’t have any nutritive worth; in reality, the physique throws them off as waste materials when they’re taken with the meals. In some strategies of cookery, resembling broiling and roasting, the extractives are retained, whereas in others, resembling these employed for making stews and soups, they’re drawn out.

Extractives happen within the best amount within the muscle tissue that the animal workout routines a terrific deal and that in actuality have turn into robust. Likewise, a sure a part of an previous animal incorporates extra extractives than the identical a part of a younger one. For these causes a really younger hen is broiled whereas an previous one is used for stew, and ribs of beef are roasted whereas the shins are used for soup.

Meat that’s allowed to hold and ripen develops compounds which are much like extractives and that impart extra taste. A ripened steak is often most popular to at least one reduce from an animal that has been killed solely a short while. Nonetheless, because the ripening is in actuality a decomposition course of, the meat is alleged to turn into “excessive” whether it is allowed to hold too lengthy.