This review explores strategies to enhance meat quality in poultry, focusing on both management and genetic methods. Poultry meat quality is influenced by many factors, including rearing conditions, nutrition, animal welfare, and post-slaughter processing. Key management factors such as stocking density, ventilation, temperature, and humidity are emphasized for their significant impact on bird welfare and the resulting meat texture, color, and microbial stability. Welfare-enhancing practices like gentle handling, environmental enrichment, and thermal comfort are highlighted for their direct effects on stress levels and meat properties such as water-holding capacity and pH. Innovations in slaughtering and chilling techniques, including electrical and gas stunning and rapid chilling, are shown to preserve meat quality and prevent common defects like pale, soft, and exudative (PSE) or dark, firm, and dry (DFD) meat. The review also underscores the importance of hygiene protocols, hazard analysis and critical control points (HACCP) systems, and traceability technologies to ensure food safety and foster consumer trust. On the genetic front, it discusses conventional selection, marker-assisted selection (MAS), and genomic selection (GS) as tools for breeding birds with better meat quality traits, including tenderness, intramuscular fat, and resistance to conditions like woody breast. Functional genomics and gene editing are identified as the leading edge of future advances. Ultimately, the review advocates for an integrated approach that balances productivity, quality, animal welfare, and sustainability. As consumer expectations increase, the poultry industry must adopt precise, science-based strategies across the entire production process to reliably deliver high-quality meat products.

Background: Using wheat flour coating food to reduce oil absorption during frying has been explored, but many alternatives exist. Aims: This study was conducted to investigate the effectiveness of polysaccharide coatings on the physicochemical and nutritional composition of deep-fried chicken breast. Materials and Methods: Pre-weighed marinated cut chunks of breast muscle were immersed in a treatment batter slurry of edible flour coatings (wheat, sweet potato, cassava, and cocoyam), refrigerated, and deep-fried. The deep-fried meats were analyzed for their proximate and mineral contents, whereas breaded meats were examined for their physicochemical properties. Results: Coating did not influence the coating yield but significantly (p<0.0001) increased frying yield and pH (p = 0.0105). Nonetheless, edible coatings had no significant impact on meat lightness (p = 0.1481), redness (p = 0.3596), and yellowness (p = 0.6852). In addition, with crude fiber and energy, which did not vary, the value of deep-fried breast muscle’s proximate composition differed significantly among treatments (p<0.05). Likewise, all mineral parameters analyzed, except magnesium, varied among treatments (p<0.05). Notably, sweet potato markedly improved physicochemical and proximate attributes among the coating materials, whereas cocoyam provided a better mineral composition than wheat flour. Conclusion: Alternative edible coatings significantly impacted deep-fried chicken breast’s physicochemical properties and nutrient and mineral composition. These findings suggest that alternative coatings can produce healthier chicken products. However, further research on their color is needed for better product acceptability.

The global poultry industry has experienced rapid growth, driven by consumer demand for affordable, high-quality protein. However, this progress has been accompanied by the emergence of growth-related myopathies, notably Spaghetti Meat (SM) and the more recently described Gaping, which compromise meat quality, yield, and marketability. SM, first reported in 2015, is characterized by the detachment and weakening of Pectoralis major fibers, resulting in a stringy, mushy texture of the meat. Gaping, affecting the Pectoralis minor, presents as separations between fiber bundles and tendon tears. Incidence rates of SM vary widely, from 10% to over 36%, while gaping prevalence remains inconsistently reported. Detection traditionally relies on visual scoring, but novel approaches, such as bioelectrical impedance, automated imaging, and spectroscopy, are under investigation to enable early identification. Histological analyses reveal shared features of muscle degeneration, fibrosis, lipid infiltration, and altered collagen structure, with oxidative stress and impaired regeneration implicated in both myopathies. Multiple factors contribute, including genetics, muscle hypertrophy, nutrition, environment, and processing conditions. Notably, delayed chilling, aggressive defeathering, immersion water chilling, and mechanical breast filleting increase SM severity, while dietary antioxidants and trace minerals can sometimes mitigate occurrence. SM and gaping affect technological quality by reducing textural integrity, protein solubility, and water-holding capacity, although their impacts are less severe than wooden breast or white striping. Current mitigation strategies focus on selective breeding, optimized nutrition, and modified processing parameters, but the complexity of these myopathies underscores the need for integrated approaches. Future research should prioritize in short term, the non-genetic strategies, including improvements in processing, nutrition, and management, while in the long term, the genetic basis of this myopathy, particularly the coexistence of affected and unaffected birds within the same population, to support balanced breeding strategies that preserve meat quality and consumer acceptance.

This study evaluated the effects of essential oil-based feed additives on carcass characteristics and breast meat quality of broiler chickens with or without Salmonella challenge. A total of 1,800 one-day-old Ross 708 male broilers were randomly assigned to nine dietary treatments from day 0 to 42: a negative control diet without Salmonella inoculation and without essential oils (NC), NC supplemented with Salvix containing 50% carvacrol at 1,100 g/ton (NC+CAR1), NC supplemented with Esencial Premix containing 45% thymol at 250 g/ton (NC+THY1), a positive control diet with Salmonella inoculation without essential oils (PC), PC supplemented with Salvix at 1,100 g/ton (PC+CAR1) or 2,200 g/ton (PC+CAR2), PC supplemented with Esencial Premix at 250 g/ton (PC+THY1) or 500 g/ton (PC+THY2), and a combination of carvacrol and thymol (COMBO). Birds were processed on day 43, and carcass yield, cut-up part weights, breast meat quality traits, proximate composition, and the incidence of breast muscle myopathies were evaluated. Dietary treatment did not influence live body weight, hot or cold carcass weight, dressing percentage, or the absolute and relative yields of major carcass components, including breast, tenders, wings, and legs (P > 0.05). Similarly, breast meat pH, shear force, shear energy, drip loss at 48 h postmortem, lightness (L*), and yellowness (b*) were not influenced by treatment (P > 0.05). Breast meat redness (a*) differed among treatments (P = 0.035), with the highest values observed in the COMBO and NC treatments, whereas the lowest redness occurred in the Salmonella-challenged positive control group. Proximate analysis showed no treatment effects on moisture, crude protein, fat, salt, total collagen, soluble collagen, or insoluble collagen fractions of breast meat (P > 0.05). The incidence and severity of woody breast, white striping, and spaghetti meat were also similar across treatments (P > 0.05). Overall, dietary supplementation with carvacrol- and thymol-based essential oils had minimal effects on carcass yield and most meat quality parameters in broilers, while differences among treatments were observed in breast meat redness under the experimental conditions of this study.