Aged beef is more tender and flavourful than beef that has not undergone the aging process. The characteristics of raw meats are influenced by a variety of factors, e.g. animal, environmental and processing. During the ageing, beef muscles undergo several changes that can affect their quality, as colour, tenderness, flavour and juiciness. Since the ageing process provides high added values that manifests in price, a quick, non-contact measurement method would be useful in industry to check ageing state. The objective of this study was to estimate the ageing time of beef sirloin samples by their reflected NIR spectra and hyperspectral datacube as well.
The hyperspectral signal-to-noise ratio had to be improved. Controlling software was developed to help proper calibration, data-acquisition and pre-processing. During 4-week ageing experiments, samples were measured by both spectral method. The ageing time and also the location of slices were registered, for making difference between the two influences. The suitability of two methods, the more accurate instrumental- and the non-contact hyperspectral measurement was proved.