Meat-like aroma components, in the present work, were generated via interaction of cysteine with bovine fat (by-product) model systems. Gas chromatography (GC) and gas chromatography/mass spectrometry (GC/MS) were used to identify the obtained volatile compounds. Thermal treatment of cysteine/ bovine fat by-product with or without water gave several thiol compounds such as 2-methyl-3-furanthiol, 2-furylmethanethiol and methyl-dihydrofuranthiol. A number of disulfides compounds were formed as 2-methyl-3-furyl-2-methyl-3-thienyldisulphide, bis-(2-methyl-3-furyl) disulphide, 2-methyl-3-furyl-methyl-2-xopropyldisulphide. Furans and sulfur-containing compounds are important precursors of meaty aromas.
Sensory evaluation of the aroma products was performed for cysteine and bovine fat by-product model systems according to (ISO) and the result revealed that the presence of volatiles having boiled note in presence of water may be due to the preponderance of thiol compounds (22.33 %) and roasted character attributes to the presence of higher content of pyrazine (1.28%), 2-methylthiazole (0.4%), furfural (3.0%) and methylfuraneol (31.47%). It was found that, the antioxidant activity of model system containing water has higher antioxidant activity (78.0±1.8%), in comparison with tert-butylhydroquinone [TBHQ] (98.73±2.3%). From the above results, the obtained natural identical meat-like aroma concentrate, could be applied as a food additives.