From some decade a modern line of products made up of fish (known as imitation fish) is available in worldwide market. They often reproduce morphological and sensorial characteristics of commercial crustaceans. The basic ingredient of these recent foodstuffs is surimi, an age-old Japanese alimentary product made up of a colourless, tasteless and odourless raw paste, obtained from a combination of ancient traditional culinary preparations and advanced technologies. Consumption of surimi products has grown remarkably in Europe in the last years, particularly in France and Spain, because they present good nutritional characteristics and they are able to satisfy consumers’ requests of foodstuffs easy to prepare and to preserve. The possibility to produce this paste from any species of fish involves the risk to employ raw materials of poor quality. This aspect, combined with the lack of a definite labelling law with regards to the name of fishes employed, is hurtful to commercial products quality and can negatively influence customers’ choice. This trend occurs, for instance, in the Italian market where these surimi derivatives are not as successful as in the rest of Europe.
IL SURIMI E I SUOI DERIVATI: ASPETTI TECNICI, ECONOMICI E TUTELA DEL CONSUMATORE
RANA, ROBERTO LEONARDO
2006-01-01
Abstract
From some decade a modern line of products made up of fish (known as imitation fish) is available in worldwide market. They often reproduce morphological and sensorial characteristics of commercial crustaceans. The basic ingredient of these recent foodstuffs is surimi, an age-old Japanese alimentary product made up of a colourless, tasteless and odourless raw paste, obtained from a combination of ancient traditional culinary preparations and advanced technologies. Consumption of surimi products has grown remarkably in Europe in the last years, particularly in France and Spain, because they present good nutritional characteristics and they are able to satisfy consumers’ requests of foodstuffs easy to prepare and to preserve. The possibility to produce this paste from any species of fish involves the risk to employ raw materials of poor quality. This aspect, combined with the lack of a definite labelling law with regards to the name of fishes employed, is hurtful to commercial products quality and can negatively influence customers’ choice. This trend occurs, for instance, in the Italian market where these surimi derivatives are not as successful as in the rest of Europe.I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.
