Fig. 5a depicts changes in lightness (L*) of sausages during ripening.
The L* values of all sausages increased significantly (P b 0.05)within the
first 48 h, and then gradually declined probably due to the rapid reduction
of pH and low RH (80%), which accelerated the weight loss of the
sausages thereby darkening the color. At the end of ripening, there
were no significant differences (P N 0.05) in L* values between treatments.
Changes in redness (a*) of sausages during ripening is shown
in Fig. 5b. While the a* value of the control sample showed a slight increasewithin
the first 48 h, the a* values of inoculated samples rose rapidly
(P b 0.05) within this same period. At the end of ripening, sausages
inoculated with starter cultures had slightly higher a* values than noninoculated
control. The results agreed with those of Gøtterup et al.
(2008) and Casaburi et al. (2007) who found that nitrosomyoglobin