Mutagenicity of Cooked Hamburger is Reduced by Addition of Ascorbate and Erythorbate

The addition of phenolic antioxidants, cysteine, N-acetylcysteine, unsaturated fatty acids, ascorbate and erythorbate has been evaluated in the reduction of free radical Maillard intermediates, the pyrazine cation radicals, and also the mutagenicity of a heated model system composed of glucose/glycine/creatinine. The aim of the present study was to determine whether these components were useful to reduce the mutage-nicity of cooked hamburger. The effect of these com-ponents, added at low concentrations to ground beef, on the generation of the mutagenicity of cooked ham-burger was examined. Mutagenicity of hamburger was assayed by the Ames test using Salmonella typhimurium TA98 strain with metabolic activation after the mu-tagens were purified by the use of blue rayon. Mu-tagenicity of hamburger was reduced to a half by the addition of ascorbate or erythorbate at 0.33%, whereas the mutagenicity was not reduced by epigallocatechin gallate (EGCG), cysteine, N-acetylcysteine, soybean oil or lard at the low concentrations. Key words —– — ascorbate, erythorbate, mutagenicity, hamburge