A group of researchers from the National Food Institute, Technical University of Denmark, have extracted a group of substances from potato peelings that prevent the development of rancid smells in minced fish.
Fish cakes are a healthy and delicious dish, but minced fish has one drawback - the minced fish meat quickly reacts with oxygen from the air, making it smell and taste rancid. However, a group of researchers at the National Food Institute have found that potato peelings counteract this.
Using a potato peel extract, which contains antioxidants, the researchers have successfully reduced or completely prevented the detrimental oxidation of the minced fish. The antioxidant extract is mixed with the minced fish meat through normal stirring.
The research group has not yet tried to add the extract to whole fillets of fish. Fish fillets are often glazed before freezing, and the researchers envisage that the extract could be added to the glaze by industrial processors if it is going to be used for frozen fish fillets.
Very often antioxidants would have different effects in different foods. However, the potato peel extract has proven to have the same effect in both pure oil, oil-in-water emulsions and in minced fish, which makes the results particularly interesting for the food industry.
At the National Food Institute, research into antioxidants is being conducted using real foods and not just in test-tube systems.
