THE EFFECT OF FEEDING DIETS CONTAINING WHITE FISHMEAL ON ACCEPTABILITY AND FLAVOR INTENSITY OF ROASTED BROILER CHICKENS

Diets containing 0, 3, 9, 14 and 19% white fishmeal and a diet containing 15% high-fat fishmeal were fed to the females of a commercial strain of broilers. Activated charcoal at the 0.5% level was added to the six finisher diets for one-half of the birds. The effect of starving birds for 24 and 72 hours after being fed the 19% fishmeal finisher diet was also evaluated; the starved birds were fed a ration containing 0% fishmeal from 63 to 72 days of age. The broilers were roasted without seasonings. A piece of dark meat and white meat with its skin from each of the diets was presented to 10 judges. This was repeated 10 times. Each judge was asked to state if the sample was acceptable or not, and to rate its flavor from no off-flavor to extreme fishy flavor. Tests were also run on cooking losses, color, moisture, texture and ether extract. Significant differences were found between the control (0% fishmeal) and the 15% high-fat and 19% fishmeal broilers for acceptability and flavor intensity. There were no significant differences found between birds fed charcoal and those not fed charcoal, nor were there any between the days of cooking for acceptability or flavor intensity. Cooking loss, color, percent fat, percent moisture and texture were not significantly affected by diets or charcoal. Starving the birds for 24 hours did not affect the acceptability or flavor intensity. Starving them for 72 hours did have a significant, favorable effect on the acceptability and flavor intensity.