Guangdong sets new standards for beef meatball production

New local standards for beef-based meatballs in Shantou, Guangdong province, a major manufacturing and sales center for the popular dish, will help provide better technical and quality standard guarantees for producers and promote sales, according to local authorities.

The new standards for the meatballs, which were implemented starting Monday, explicitly require that the product must have a beef content of over 90 percent, or the total content of beef and beef tendons must exceed 90 percent, said Shantou's official WeChat account.

Compared with previous standards, which were issued in 2016, the most significant change in the new standards is its increased applicability, meaning both beef and beef tendon meatballs must adhere to the new standards.

The move will help promote sales of authentic beef-based meatballs and beef tendon balls produced in Shantou, according to industrial insiders.

It is very important to standardize each beef-based meatball manufacturing company to ensure the quality and safety of the products. With the new standards, there will be fewer additives in the meatballs, according to an unnamed insider in Shantou.

The revised definition of beef-based meatballs in Shantou states that they must be made from fresh or frozen segmented beef, with or without beef tendons, as raw materials, with a beef meat content greater than 90 percent, or with the sum of beef meat and beef tendon content exceeding 90 percent.

The meatballs must not include edible by-products of cattle such as organs, fat, blood, bones, skin, head, hooves and tail, according to the new standard.

Production involves adding appropriate amounts of water, salt, starch and other ingredients, using traditional Shantou-based pounding or mechanical methods to grind the meat into a ball-shaped, solidified product with unique local characteristics that is not ready-to-eat.

The labeling of prepackaged products should indicate the names of the product's raw materials and ingredients, beef meat and tendon content, non-ready-to-eat information and cooking instructions.

Bulk products should have the product name, raw materials and ingredient names, beef meat and beef tendon content, production date or batch number and shelf life, as well as the name, address and contact information of the producer on the packaging container and outer packaging.

Traditional beef-based meatballs, famous in Shantou and Chaozhou in eastern Guangdong, are well known Chinese snacks with a history of nearly a century.

The new standards provide better technical standard guarantees for enterprises producing beef-based meatballs, meeting the daily quality supervision requirements of market regulatory authorities for the products and the food safety requirements of consumers, according to the local government.

qiuquanlin@chinadaily.com.cn