MEAT QUALITY, BLOOD STRESS INDICATORS AND TRIMMED CUT YIELD COMPARISON OF BLACK SLAVONIAN PIG WITH MODERN PIGS IN THE PRODUCTION OF SLAVONIAN KULEN

e) Same address as a) , Prof., Ph.D., M.Sc. ABSTRACT The muscle quality traits (pH 1 and pH 24 and colour of M. longissimus dorsi), blood stress indicators (CPK - creatine phosphokinase, LDH - lactate dehidrogenase, AST - aspartat aminotransferase and glucose) and trimmed cut lean yield (proportion of selected lean meat of hams, loin, shoulders and neck) were evaluated for traditional Black Slavonian (BS) and modern pig genotypes: Large White × Swedish Landrace (LW×SL) and Large White × Swedish Landrace sired with Duroc (LW×SL)×D used for the production of Slavonian Kulen sausages. The BS pigs had the lowest serum CPK and AST activity which indicates their lower suspectability to stress (P<0.05). The pH values were inside normal pork quality range for all evaluated genotypes but the older BS and (LW×SL)×D pigs have more desirable loin colour (lower L* and higher a* values) for Slavonian Kulen processing. The trimmed cut lean yield (%) of hams was the lowest in BS pigs (29.31% of primal cut and 7.04% of carcass, P<0.05). The (LW×SL)×D group had the highest trimmed cut lean yield of loin (34.14% and 4.93%, P<0.05) and the LW×SL group had the lowest utilization of neck (22.31% and 1.12%, P<0.05). For shoulders there were no statistically significant differences. In total, the utilization of primal cuts for the production of Slavonian Kulen in BS group (26.75%) were considerably lower than in (LW×SL)×D group (32.33%, P<0.05) and utilization of carcass for production of Slavonian Kulen was higher within the (LW×SL)×D pigs (19.85%, P<0.05) than in BS (16.26%) and LW×SL (16.28%) pigs.