Marinating pork in beer before cooking it on the bar-b-q lowers the amount of potentially cancer causing polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) compared to unmarinated pork.
That was the interesting news from a paper published in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry last month. The researchers marinated pork in pilsner lager, non alcohol pilsner lager and a black beer. The pork was then cooked to a level of “well done” and the amount of PAHs measured and compared to the non marinated meat.
Black beer was the best, reducing the PAHs by over 50%. The non alcoholic pilsner reduced it by 25% and the normal pilsner by approx 13%.
The reasoning behind the reduction in PAHs is to do with antioxidants and the team have previously shown that red wine, white wine and tea are effective at reducing heterocyclic amines that are also produced during cooking and can be carcinogenic. It was found that from a flavour point of view people preferred the beer marinades.
With summer on the way I am considering to confirm their results myself, all in the name of science of course…
Click here to go to the paper on the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry website.