Determination of salt content in raw beef burger using microwave technique

M.N. Badaruzzaman and H. Mohamed Shafit

Abstract

The information on salt content in processed food is important for public knowledge such as in food labelling and regulations which can be used for health assessment and consumer protection. Chemical analysis is normally used to obtain an accurate measurement of the salt content but this analytical method is time consuming and requires special equipment with expensive cost. This type of analysis is considered as invasive and destructive. Microwave sensor can provide rapid online and non destructive technique for the determination of salt content in processed food. A dielectric probe method was used to measure the dielectric properties of raw meat burger with salt content from 0.5 – 5% at 200 MHz – 10 GHz frequencies. At lower frequencies, the results obtained show a linear relationship between both the dielectric constant and dielectric loss with the salt content of the raw burger. The standard error of prediction (SEP) for percentage of salt content from dielectric properties measurement was 0.11% of the dielectric constant model equation and 0.12% of the dielectric loss model equation. Plots of dielectric properties against salt content showed good potential for the methods to be accurately calibrated.

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