When we cook meat in the pan, whether it is beef, chicken, turkey or pork, something that frequently happens is that the piece of meat begins to release water. This causes the meat to cook instead of browning as we would like, resulting in a dry, tough, rubbery and unappetizing texture.
Faced with this situation, many people think that the fact that the meat releases so much water is precisely because they had injected water into the piece, or antibiotics or hormones. Nothing could be further from the truth. Miguel A. Lurueña, doctor in Food Science and Technology, explains on his Instagram profile the reason why meat releases water when cooking.
Under the alias @gominolasdepetroleo, Miguel A. Lurueña disseminates on Instagram about aspects related to nutrition and food science. He has 95.2 thousand followers on this social network and 78.1 thousand on X (formerly Twitter).
This week, an X user sent him a photograph of a piece of Iberian loin strip that, when put in the pan, had released a large amount of liquid. “According to the packaging, premium meat,” explained the user, adding: “Nothing in water. Disgusting”.
The food technologist has explained that this phenomenon has nothing to do with the use of hormones, antibiotics or water injection. “The use of hormones and antibiotics to increase performance has been prohibited for years: they can only be used for health purposes and in that case time is allowed until slaughter so that they are not present in the meat,” he explains. “The analyzes indicate that they are not (99.83% of the samples analyzed in the EU comply in this regard),” underlines the expert.
Miguel A. Lurueña argues that what really happens is that “meat is like a sponge loaded with water: it is composed of 24% proteins that retain approximately 75% water.” Therefore, when we put it on the pan, “the heat causes its contraction and the release of juices: water and soluble proteins, these form foam and then coagulate with the heat, forming that kind of gray rubber.”
Several factors influence the process, such as the pan itself, the type of meat, the piece and the age of the animal. But the most relevant thing is the cooking. If the meat and pan are very cold, more juice will come out.
To prevent this from happening, he advises pre-tempering the meat instead of cooking it straight out of the refrigerator and putting it on a very hot pan. Likewise, it is advisable not to put too much, so that it does not cool down. It is also important that the pan is of quality and maintains the heat well, as well as not setting the heat too low.
