Turning Lemons into Lemonade and Cattle Hide into Snacks

Background

Almost half (44%) of a harvested cattle carcass can be classified as by-products. The hide can account for 10% of live weight and 30-75% of by-product value. Most of the hide is used for leather, hide trim is great for cosmetics and pharmaceutical development because of the bioactive properties of the protein collagen, of which exist in high proportions in hide. However, when small packing plants can’t find buyers for their cattle hides, they may end up in landfills, contributing to waste and the beef sector’s GHG footprint. This begs for a solution to take advantage of these hides, high in readily available nutrients which can be used to produce products that improve human health and food security. The swine industry solved this problem by developing pork rinds. This team seeks to take advantage of the high nutrient content of these hides, and up-cycle them into a healthy, value-added, alternative food product.

Objectives

The overarching objective is to add value to fresh salted, or unsalted, defective unused hides and hide trimmings from beef abattoirs and turn them into food products and food-co-products. To do so, this team seeks to:

• Determine an efficient method for de-hairing hides for food product development.
• Characterize the composition of cattle hides after de-hairing and cleaning.
• Quantify the recovered fat and hair which are isolated in the de-hairing process.
• Develop a processing method to de-hair hides and further processing for food product development to ensure microbiological safety and improve nutrient bioavailability of food products made from processed hides.
• Characterize the physical and nutritional composition of food products developed from processed hides.
• Develop a lab-scale method to produce three different food products developed using hides (chips/crackers/rinds, soup, and dry hide meat protein).
• Conduct sensory and cost-benefit analyses to assess consumer acceptance and willingness to pay for food products derived from hides.
• Identify further processing avenues for co-products of hide foods (gelatin, fat and hair) and recycling options for co-products.

What they will do

These researchers will evaluate the best methods to process hides into food, co-food, and pharmaceutical products. They will carry out six experiments:

• Identify the way that effectively cleans and dehairs hides while optimizing fat and hide recovery.

• Consumer acceptability and sensory attributes – hides will be prepared as rinds, soup and dry hide meat protein for a taste-taste experiment using international panelists who are familiar with similar products.

• Identify how to optimize collagen and gelatin yields.

• Characterize gelatin (gel strength, opaqueness, viscosity, and suitability) for potential use in gel caps and pharmaceuticals.

• Bioactive peptides will be produced using papain and alcalase enzymes, using bed ion-exchange chromatography to purify the peptides.

• Keratin will be extracted from hair and characterized to identify potential commercial applications and value.

Implications

Cattle hides are already commonly consumed in some African countries and pork rinds (pork hide product) are found in snack food aisles of grocery stores and gas stations all over North America. Being able to utilize hide trimmings in this fashion would not only reduce food waste and the industry’s environmental footprint, but also open a potential new market in the alternative food space with a high-quality, high protein snack food option.