Mediated curing strategy: An overview of salt reduction for dry-cured meat products

ABSTRACT

Dry-cured meat products are popular worldwide because of their distinct flavor. However, the high sodium chloride levels of these products have raised public health concerns. Accordingly, to meet the needs of consumers, it is necessary to develop low-salt dry-cured meat products with high quality and safety. In this review, we discuss the effects of salt on dry-cured meat products, current research on salt reduction, and the advantages and disadvantages of salt reduction strategies. In addition, we also summarize salt reduction methods for meat products using exogenous mediation strategies, discuss salt reduction mechanisms used for mediated curing, and present future research directions for mediated salting strategies.

KEYWORDS:

• Dry-cured meat products
• sodium chloride
• salt reduction strategy
• mediated curing

Acknowledgments

This research is financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 32060554), Guizhou High-level Innovative Talent Training Project (Qianke Cooperation Platform Talent number [2016]5662), Guizhou Science and Technology Program (QKHPTRC [2020] 5004, QKHZC [2020]1Y152).

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China [32060554]; Guizhou Science and Technology Program [[2020] 5004, [2020]1Y152]; Guizhou High-level Innovative Talent Training Project [[2016]5662].