Effect of mild subcritical fluid treatment on meat quality of farmed large yellow croakers

Farmed large yellow croaker fish have stronger fishy smell and less tender texture than wild-caught ones, mostly caused by the high fat accumulation from aquaculture feeding patterns. To improve the commercial value of fillets, this study investigated a mild subcritical fluid treatment with subcritical butane (SBE) and dimethyl ether (SDME). Changes in the chemical compositions, volatile flavor compounds (VFCs) and protein denaturation were determined for 1–5 h treatments. The results showed 24 % and 44 % defatting levels under SBE and SDME treatment, respectively. GC-MS showed that SDME could induce a significant reduction of total VFC content, especially for the dominant aldehydes. There was less n-nonanal (14.65–40.13 mg/kg) and octanal content (1.67–7.21 mg/kg), no detection of trans, trans-2,4-decadienal in the SDME treated samples in comparison to those treated with SBE. The results showed that SDME treatment for 3 h had the best defatting effect, good deodorization effect and less degradation of fish protein.